Of Nothing in Particular
by tumbaleguineaboar
Summary: Nikita is a successful auror with nothing particularly extraordinary going on in her life, but what happens when her world becomes merged with the world of Richard Castle? Mix in some wizarding mafia, a murder, a bunch of quite interesting friends and an awesome kid, and you've got yourself a soup of entropy.
1. Of Rain, Work, and Nice Strangers

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except my imagination and internet connection. That is all.**

**I actually have nothing of value to say yet, so please read & review (destroy to pieces if you have to, I'm not gonna get offended) for a free cyber cookie! **

**- Ana**

Nikita strode through the streets of London, umbrella in hand, her head slightly tilted forward to avoid sudden gusts of wind blowing rain droplets into her glasses. Although she supposed it was her own fault. She just HAD to pick this day to forget to put in her contact lenses, not to mention that glasses weren't exactly a safe choice, considering what her job entailed.

She paused slightly on the sidewalk to zip up her leather jacket, attempting to position her umbrella between her neck and shoulder in order to free both her hands.  
The weather was definitely not on her side today. It had been sunny for the past two weeks, which was partly why she hadn't bothered to check the forecast for today. Which, if her wet hair and soaked through jeans were any indication, was a rather dumb idea.

She cursed, as a bout of wind overturned her umbrella, causing her to take a few sideways steps to regain her balance. In her struggle to stabilize herself, it was only then did she notice that something had fallen out of her back pocket when it had landed on the pavement with a 'clang' and was rolling away down the street.  
Crap. Not that.

She quickly leaned down to pick it up without anyone noticing, but it was too late. A hand reached out with her own to snatch up the object, and they managed to get to it first.

Nikita straightened out, determined to fight for it if she had to, but there was no need. The stranger was already standing up, his head cocked slightly to the side as he seemed to be carefully examining her with his blue eyes, the object clutched tightly in his left hand.

He cleared his throat slightly.

"Here's your uhh...stick".

She considered him for a second, then held her hand out for the object.

"Thanks", she muttered as he placed it into her palm.

"Sure thing", he said. "Have a nice day".

Nikita nodded at him and dropped the object into her purse, making sure to zip it tightly to prevent any future incidents. When she straightened out once more, the man was nowhere in sight. She shrugged and continued her journey towards a pub where she could kill a few hours before coming back to work.

The Leaky Cauldron was generally empty this time of day, save for a couple of unemployed Hogwarts graduates and some housewives taking a break from their mid-day shopping. Which was probably why Nikita's appearance in the bar wasn't noticed by many, despite the distinctive uniform and the confident stare of the young auror. It wasn't that aurors weren't welcome at the bar; however their appearance often meant that trouble was well on its way. Ever since the end of the Second Wizarding War, an auror became something to be feared rather than admired, much like the unspeakables in the previous century. Perhaps because of their fierce contribution during the War, much of which was passed by tongue rather than written word, the auror's image morphed into that of an unstoppable killing machine, determined to do the right thing by the means of murder and sabotage. The public was convinced that peacekeeping was a second rank job to the aurors, their primary objective was to find crime and punish it with merciless severity. Their weariness of aurors was not quite unfounded; in the aftermath of War it wasn't uncommon for an auror squad to appear in the middle of Diagon Alley in pursuit of some criminal, breaking windows with stray curses and often accidentally hitting civilians with one spell or another. Needless to say St. Mungo's was quite busy patching up the accidental targets.

In reality however, being an auror took both guts and a great chunk of responsibility. Nikita knew that well enough, and chose to ignore the unfriendly stares she got from the public eye. While the muggle police force was divided into definitive ranks and departments where each person did their own 'thing', the auror office both looked and operated somewhat differently. The aurors, instead of being divided by task, were divided temporarily by separate teams being assigned different murder cases, which involved everything from going out on the field to track down the guilty party, to the mundane hours of paperwork and old evidence collection. At times it was dangerous and at times utterly boring, but either way it was overwhelmingly rewarding, and that was why Nikita loved her job.

She sat down at the bar and asked old Tom for a firewhiskey. Unlike muggle cop etiquette, it wasn't against the law for aurors to drink on the job. For some, alcohol was the equivalent of a calming draft after long nights of pursuit, attacks and defences, and more often than not the rain itself caused the aurors to reach for the glass of throat-burning liquid. It was their constant therapy and often the only thing to stay in their lives long enough. This wasn't quite the case for Nikita, but at the moment she was freezing cold and needed to feel the warmth of firewhiskey spreading through her body.

She had spent the morning trailing a suspect through muggle London, hoping to come across any suspicious behaviour on his part, but she hadn't gotten much out of her adventure. He was a rather boring man, who had spent two hours browsing the atlas section in a muggle bookstore, which ended in his leaving the shop carrying twelve different atlases, and Nikita buying the first murder mystery novel she had seen on the shelf in order to avoid looking suspicious. She hadn't even looked at the cover before shoving the book into her bag and had continued her spying game well into the afternoon, when she was met by a fellow auror Jackson who muttered a quiet "I'll take it from here, Dan wants you to take a two hour break".

So here she was, taking her break at the Leaky, with nothing to do but drink and wait for two hours to tick away. She used to just skip her breaks, but lately Dan had been strict about policy, and enforced the break protocol on all his employees. Oh well, she'd just have to wait. Tom brought her another drink and Nikita reached into her bag to fish out a couple galleons, when she realized that she _did_ have something to do to pass time. Her book lay there, gleaming red in the dimly lit pub, the gold letters clearly making out _When it Comes to Slaughter_ by _Richard Castle_.

She took it out and flipped to the last page where the author description was written on the inside fold of the cover. It was a weird habit of hers to read author descriptions before she read the actual book. Richard Castle. She looked at the picture above the description and her eyes widened slightly. She had seen that man before. She recognized the handsome man in the picture, with his neatly combed hair and a somewhat sly, crooked grin as the face of the man who had handed her back her wand not a full hour ago.

Well, she mused, she had met Richard Castle.


	2. Of Broken Noses and Crazy Friends

**Hey guys! **

**So here's the thing: I put my name in the story. That's all. Don't judge me.**

**Also, I've got a question: how often do you want me to update this? Should I update as I write, or should I set a specific day/two days of the week for uploading? I'm leaning towards the second option cause I'd rather have a set schedule with deadlines, but I think I'll leave it up to the vote. **

**Please read and review! It's a lot easier to write (and it makes me happier) if I get feedback!**  
**Thanks!**

**-Ana**

**Disclaimer: I only own me, myself, and I (also some cookies, but those will be gone in five minutes).**

The long, gruelling day of filling out paperwork, combined with the seemingly endless rain had left Nikita drained to the core both mentally and physically. As she locked the door of her office and left the building, the only things on her mind were a hot shower and a cup of chai in front of the fire when she got home. Nikita figured if she wanted chai right away, she'd better call home and have her best friend and roommate Ana take care of it, so that she wouldn't have to waste time making it herself.

She stuck her hand into her pocket and took out her phone, careful to keep her wand from falling out as well. She really had to stop sticking her wand in her back pockets, she just knew that someday she'd end up either cursing her own ass into oblivion, or breaking the wand itself by sitting on it. After all, her phone was already in a bad shape from falling out of her pockets all the time. She wanted so badly to fix it up with magic, but she was afraid it would end up messing with the actual telephone line. The last thing she needed was for the muggle phone company to investigate her account if she ended up cutting an entire area of reception.

Nikita dialed a number on the phone, and put it to her ear, listening to the familiar beeps, until she heard a grumpy "What?" on the other end, accompanied by the distinctive sound of ripping paper.

"Ana?" Nikita paused, trying to figure out what was going on. "What the hell are you doing?!"

"Drew Antarctica wrong apparently, now they want me to redo the entire damn thing", huffed the voice. "What's up?"

Nikita rolled her eyes. Typical Ana.

"Make me chai, I'm on my way." The ripping noise stopped abruptly.

"What?"

"I said make me chai," Nikita repeated. "How difficult is that to understand?"

"You mean, without your supervision?" Ana sounded shocked by the idea.

"That's right", Nikita nodded, even though she knew quite well that Ana couldn't actually see her.

"Uh...alright, I'll do my best", she could now hear Ana's footsteps carrying from the living room towards the kitchen.

"Cool, I'll see you in a bit then", she said and hung up.

Despite the fact that she specifically told Ana to make chai without her supervision, Nikita was still worried. She hoped the worst Ana could do would be to accidentally burn down her kitchen (yes, she thought of it as _her_ kitchen, since Ana only ever visited the alcohol and coffee cupboards), but she'd made Ana watch the chai-making process enough times for her to know what to do...or so she hoped.

_Now_, Nikita thought as she looked around the quiet muggle neighbourhood, _quickly and discreetly before anyone gets half a glance at you._ She had to get out of this place before any muggles came about to stare at her auror uniform. And with that, Nikita disapparated right in the middle of the street, despite Apparation Law 22, that no witch or wizard was to apparate or disapparate during daylight hours within a high-traffic muggle vicinity. The kicker was that Nikita herself had helped to write the 37 Apparation Laws and Guidelines, and now she was helping to break them too.

She apparated right in front of her door just as it opened, which then hit her right in the face and sent her tumbling backwards. Dazed, she straightened herself and threw a glare at the blonde girl in the doorway, who was keeled over in laughter.

"I'm sorry!" Ana choked out in between her laughs. "That was absolutely BRILLIANT! Are you okay?"

Clearly, today was NOT Nikita's day - she could feel blood slowly dripping down her face. Ana stopped laughing and came over to look at the damage, taking out her wand from behind her ear as she walked. She twirled it in her hand, pointed it at Nikita's face, and removed the blood with a s_courgify_. Nikita regarded her warily.

"Call Vanessa", she told Ana. "You're absolute crap at healing spells. If you do it, you'll probably end up dissolving my face in acid or something."

"Right," Ana placed her wand back behind her ear, and pulled a phone out of her back pocket.

Nikita was glad that Ana wasn't arguing for once, or she would end up bleeding to death in the middle of a screaming match. Not that she screamed at Ana often, she knew the girl wasn't half as stupid as she portrayed herself to others, but her stubbornness never failed to annoy the crap out of half the human population.

"Yo Nessa," Ana's voice halted Nikita's train of thought. "Can you come over? I kind of hit Nikita in the face here, and she looks like she'll die if you don't save her."

She paused for a moment and listened to the voice on the other end before bellowing "NO, I'm NOT taking her to St. Mungos. How am I supposed to explain this? Of all the things to have injured an auror, it just had to be a door smacking her in the face!"

She paused again, tapping her foot impatiently. "Yes, you could say it was my fault. Shut up and get your ass over here before she bleeds to death."

Ana placed her phone back in her back pocket and turned to Nikita.

"Looks like you had a rough day", she observed.

Nikita shrugged. It had been rough, despite the fact that nothing of value had really happened.

"It's the rain," she said. "Let's go inside, why the hell are we still standing here anyway?"

Nikita shook her head again and started inside for the kitchen. She wished Vanessa would arrive sooner rather than later; her nose had started throbbing again, despite the freezing charm Ana had put on it. It always seemed Vanessa was running into floo network problems, despite the fact that Nikita's floo was connected directly to her fireplace. She sighed wearily and her hopes that home would offer comfort and a cup of hot chai seemed to be melting further away by the minute. All thanks to Ana.

Nikita loved Ana, she really did, but she couldn't fathom how the girl was still not written out of this world by natural selection. Trivial tasks which could be done by practically anyone and were usually considered necessary for basic survival were quite foreign to Ana. Considering that the most complex meal Ana had ever successfully cooked was a grilled cheese sandwich (now referred to exclusively as the ana-sandwich), Nikita highly doubted that 'growing up' was ever part of her friend's vocabulary, and therefore saw it as part of her job to look over and attempt to rectify the general idiocy she radiated.

She and Ana had been in the same year at Hogwarts. They'd met on the train in their first year, finding an immediate connection over the fact that both of them had already read _Hogwarts: A History _twice over that past summer. Although they'd been sorted into different houses when they arrived at Hogwarts, they'd maintained a close friendship throughout the years.

They were a strange pair, often looked at with considerable distrust by their fellow students. Nikita wasn't surprised at this - an exceptional Ravenclaw constantly in close contact with a hard-boiled Slytherin was bound to be explosive for everyone else.

They'd caused some ruckus alright, mainly by Ana's initiative, although perfected and polished by Nikita's wit, which had left them with a considerable amount of mutual craziness. It was only Nikita's overpowering sense of responsibility and common sense (which Ana lacked completely) that prevented their expulsion from the school - which would've inevitably happened had Ana's plan to steal their Ancient Runes final exam been uncovered. Overall, Nikita had saved them about a year in detention time and was the reason they had even graduated with everyone else in their year.

Although Ana's ambitious personality had gotten her decent marks over the years, she really was rubbish at healing spells, a fact that even she accepted without argument.

Vanessa arrived within five minutes, for which Nikita was eternally grateful. The bleeding had increased, and all Ana did was tell her that she should just chop the rest of her nose off to continue Lord Voldemort's fashion statement. Not helpful.

Which was why, when the fireplace erupted in green flames, Nikita jumped right off the couch and was standing in front of the fire, ready for Vanessa to appear before Ana could add another smart-ass comment to the list.

Vanessa was quite an unusual witch, whose habits varied rather greatly from those around her. For one, she absolutely loathed apparating and generally preferred to use the floo network whenever possible. No one quite understood why, since apparating was often the easier option of transportation that didn't require the dangerous art of fireplace hunting to take place, or the hazard of falling off a broomstick for those that preferred to fly. But, despite having an international level apparition license (Nikita had once discovered an apparition badge inside Vanessa's coat pocket), she insisted on flooing from place to place.

"Hey guys," Vanessa said as stepped out of the fireplace and brushed the soot from her clothes. She continued briskly, "Ana, stop being useless and go fetch me something to drink. Nikita, look at me, please."

Ana left for the kitchen without protest, an action that caused Nikita to raise an eyebrow at Vanessa as she turned to face her.

"How the hell did you train her to do that? She'd throw a fit if I did that!"

Vanessa shrugged, but otherwise didn't reply, instead focusing her attention on Nikita's nose and muttering healing enchantments under her breath.

Nikita still wondered where Vanessa had learned wandless magic. It was a rare talent, which took many years to acquire and was therefore possessed only by the most brilliant and patient wizards. Three years ago, as nothing but an average fresh-out-of-Hogwarts graduate, Vanessa had disappeared off the King's Cross platform without so much as a single goodbye to anyone. When she'd resurfaced in London once more last year with a new confidence and a seemingly bottomless Gringotts account, her skills had become a wonder among the English wizards, and alas, a real mystery to Nikita.

No matter how much Nikita asked her where she'd learnt it all, Vanessa always replied with shrugs or vague hand gestures, not once giving a direct answer. Ana boasted that she knew exactly where Vanessa had been and how her sudden brilliance had emerged, but Nikita suspected that anything she claimed to know was simply a mix of speculation and her own wild imagination. Such was the world of Ana.

"There, you're all fixed up now!" Vanessa's voice broke Nikita out of her reverie.

Nikita touched her nose and realized it was whole once more. No more Voldemort jokes. Thank Merlin.

"Thanks Vanessa, can't say I could fix your nose as well, but Butterbeer is on me next time, okay?"

Vanessa chuckled. "No worries, that's what I'm here for. To be the St. Mungo's when St. Mungo's can't be. But I won't say no to a Butterbeer!"

Ana emerged from the kitchen then, attempting to balance three mugs of steaming chai in her arms. What an idiot…

"Have you not heard of_ wingardium leviosa_?" Nikita asked, as she pointed her wand at the mugs, which immediately flew out of Ana's reach and distributed themselves on different sides of the coffee table in the living room. Ana's facial expression was rather vacant for someone who had just practically been called a moron. That was a strange reaction, very un-Ana-ish. She'd have to look into that at some point.

"You fixed her nose", stated Ana brightly, arms now devoid of precariously balanced beverages.

"Indeed," replied Vanessa, as she plopped herself down onto the couch and grabbed a steaming mug. "So what have you two been up to lately?" she inquired as she took a sip of her chai, " Apart from breaking noses and such."

"Meh", Nikita and Ana replied simultaneously. Vanessa raised an eyebrow.

"Have you two merged into the same person or something? It must be the whole living together arrangement; very eloquent by the way".

"Thanks," Nikita grinned. Ana, however, stayed unusually silent. _Seriously, what was with her today?_

Nikita spread herself out on the sofa and closed her eyes. It was moments like these which made her life worthwhile, as sad as that sounded. She was home, with her two best friends in the room, just lying on the couch with a hot cup of chai and relaxing after a long and boring day of work. This was the best feeling. Even better was that her nose was fixed AND Ana hadn't burned down the kitchen. The chai was quite tasty too. Nikita was about to compliment Ana's chai-making when Ana's phone rang, disrupting the quiet moment. Ana bolted up from the couch over to the counter where her phone lay to take the call. Nikita sighed.

Living with Ana was a decision she'd made straight out of Hogwarts, and while she in no way regretted that choice, she wished that life at home would be slightly less hectic than work. But Ana was usually quite jumpy, and on the rare occasions when she was calm something would usually happen to change that. Such as phone calls.

Nikita had no idea why, but phone calls freaked Ana out big time. It was something she'd gotten used to now, but the first few times she'd seen Ana's reaction to her phone ringing, she was quite ready to ring up St. Mungo's and ask them to take her friend away, because Ana's behavior was in no way normal. Every single time the phone rang, Ana's eyes would widen almost to the size of dinner plates, she would jump up from where she was sat and sprint toward her phone like her life was dependent on it.

"Do you know why she does that?" asked Vanessa, looking at her from her place on the loveseat.

Nikita shook her head. All she knew was that the calls had something to do with Ana's job, but she had no clue as to what they actually meant.

Ana then charged into the living room at top speed, frantically searching it with her plate-sized eyes. Finally locating what she was looking for, she ran towards the far corner of the room, picked up a number of rolled up map sketches (or that's what Nikita assumed they were), spun on her heel and headed straight for the door, grabbing her wand and a set of keys along the way.

"Where are you off to?" Nikita asked, not really expecting to receive an answer.

"Out," grumbled Ana, and slammed the door behind her.

Nikita heard a faint pop from behind the closed door, and Ana was gone.

"Any idea what she's doing?" Vanessa was looking at her expectantly for an explanation.

Nikita sighed and put her mug down.

"Haven't got the faintest idea. For all we know, she could be flying off to China with those maps. I've stopped asking, it's quite useless. All I know about today's matters is that she drew Antarctica wrong."

"Antarctica, hm?" Vanessa mused as she picked up Ana's deserted chai, taking a sip. "Good idea," Nikita thought aloud, gesturing to Ana's reclaimed chai, "It'd probably be cold by the time the crazy girl got back anyways."

Nikita decided it was time to change the subject. As much as she herself wanted to know what her friend was up to with her rather suspicious disappearances and strange behaviour, she knew that it was a fruitless topic of conversation.

"So when's Kellan coming back?" she asked.

"He said he'll be back before the end of the month, but I'm not sure how that'll work out. Apparently Charlie Weasley asked him to be his successor," Vanessa scratched her head and sighed.

"You miss him, don't you?"

"_Miss_ him?!" Vanessa snorted. "I'll _kill_ him when he gets back! Leaving me for a whole month for those damn dragons!"

It was Nikita's turn to snort.

"Sure you will. You'll smother him with love the second you see him," she stuck her tongue out at Vanessa.

"Very mature", Vanessa grumbled, trying to counter the grin spreading across her face as she placed Ana's mug back on the coffee table. She stretched and proceeded to stand up.

"Well, I should probably head out. It's late enough as it is, and I've got a meeting tomorrow morning."

"What meeting?" Nikita tried.

"Never you mind, you nosy witch", came the reply. "Now, where's your floo powder?"

"The mantelpiece. Turn off the lights before you go, my head hurts from all the brightness and commotion."

Vanessa nodded and flicked the lights off. Nikita could hear her toss the Floo powder in the fireplace, and Vanessa hollering, "And try to keep your nose on, will yah?" just before the _whoosh _as she disappeared into the green flames, and then silence.

Nikita pulled a blanket over herself and closed her eyes. She'd had a very long day.

It was time to rest.


	3. Of Murder, Coffee, and Insufferable Gits

**Hullo fellow humans, enjoy the new chapter!  
I had lots of fun writing this one.**

**Read and REVIEW please! Or, like, leave a nice comment in the review section or something. Or sing me a lullaby. Or yell at me. Or tell me how wonderful my hair looks today. Something!**

**- Ana**

**Oh! Almost forgot!**

**Disclaimer: I hold no ownership of anything. Like...anything. Can you guys send me a table or something?**

Nikita was awoken by the sound of her phone ringing.

She looked over at the alarm clock on the coffee table.

4:17am.

_What. The. Hell.  
_  
Silently cursing whoever had decided to call her up in the middle of the bloody night, she sat up on the sofa and took the call.

"Oi, get down here, there's an exciting murder for you to look at", came Dan's voice.

_Ugh._

"I'm not even on duty Dan, why the hell are you calling me?" she complained loudly into the phone.

"Oh trust me, you'll want to see this one", came Dan's reply. He sounded way too happy, considering that it was still the middle of the night and he was talking about murder.

"Fine", she said dejectedly, balancing the phone between her shoulder and ear and rubbing her exhausted eyes with her fists. "Text me the location. I'll be there in ten".

Nikita hung up and chucked her phone on the sofa. Why Dan specifically wanted _her_ to take the case was beyond her understanding. Although he probably just wanted to kill her with work or something. She wouldn't put it past him.

She got off the sofa and headed for her bedroom to find some clean clothes to wear, since she had fallen asleep in her uniform. Dan wouldn't care if she wasn't in uniform; she was off duty anyway.

She slid into a pair of black jeans, put on a trench coat and slipped on a pair of boots, hoping she wouldn't freeze to death in the early-morning chill. Nikita looked herself over in the mirror and decided that washing her face in cold water would have to do for now, she couldn't be bothered to fix her makeup at 4am.

She paused to check Ana's room, but the girl was still not home. That was quite unusual, she'd have to text Vanessa and ask her to track Ana down.

Aiming a _scourgify_ at her hair on her way out, Nikita locked the front door and disapparated to the location that Dan had texted her.

Aurors were specifically trained to apparate to locations they've only ever seen as a combination of numbers and letters on a page; it was a skill which took quite some effort to learn, but came in really handy when their immediate presence was required on a scene.

There was still a mark on Nikita's thumb from her first days of training, when somebody had handed her an incomplete address to which she attempted to apparate, inevitably splinching herself. Her right thumb had remained in the training arena, while she herself materialised in Australia in the middle of a rainforest.

They'd fixed the injury with a simple healing spell, but a thin scar remained on her thumb where it had been torn off.

Such was the life of an auror.

Nikita apparated in a front of a run-down apartment complex on the other side of town. The dim lights from the lamp posts shone miserably through the fogginess of night.

"Oi, Niks!" a male voice called out to her from the darkness. "Come see this!"

She recognized the voice as Travis Hall, her co-worker. Nikita walked toward the sound of his voice and was met with a rather strange scene. Muggle cops were huddles around a body of a large shaggy man with black curly hair and an unruly beard. Dan, Travis, and Ryan (her other colleague), were standing a distance away, observing the muggles as they investigated the crime scene.

Nikita knew that the aurors were invisible to the cops – a combination of a strong disillusionment charm combined with a set of muggle repellent charms; it was one of the tricks taught in concealment class during the first year of training. She walked up to the group of aurors and nodded at Dan, who looked ready to jump out of his skin from excitement.

"What's going on?" she asked him.

"That," Dan pointed to the body, "is a muggle. They're trying to figure out how he died."

"And?" Nikita prompted.

"There's nothing wrong with him. He's just…dead," explained Travis.

"Then how do you know it's a murder?"

Ryan grinned.

"Oh, that's the best part," he said. "Muggles saw flashes of strange light and screaming coming from this area, so they reported to the police. We didn't receive any notification that the Statute of Secrecy has been violated either, so the killer must have known how to get around our security system."

"Do we know the cause of death?"

"We only know that it was some sort of killing spell. There aren't any signs of torture on the body. The murder was clean, quick, and painless. Quite a professional delivery if you ask me," replied Dan enthusiastically.

Nikita made a mental note to give her boss a calming draft once they got back to the office.

"Why am I here again?" she asked him. "I'm not on duty until tomorrow evening."

"We need your _confundus_ so we can take a good look at the body", Ryan replied, smacking her in the arm. "I'll take your shift tomorrow."

Of course, she should've known. While other aurors excelled in stunners, concealment spells, and memory charms, her specialty was, as Ana had once phrased it, the ability to magically confuse the shit out of people. She couldn't deny that it was a useful skill of course, but it looked rather dull in comparison to all others.

Nikita ran her hand through her hair and reached into her pocket for her wand.

"How do you want me to do it?" she asked Ryan, who was in the process of taking out a notepad and a quill.

"Confund them all at once, I need the field cleared," he said.

Nikita nodded. That she could do.

She pointed her wand at the largest cop and muttered a quiet _confundo_, followed by a few distraction spells which caused the muggle cop party to move away from the body and into their respective vehicles.

The aurors approached the body, careful to keep their disillusionment charm in place, and leant over to examine it. Nikita's eyes were trained on the muggles as she continued to cast spells in their general direction, but her mind was elsewhere.

The skyline was beginning to lighten as morning approached, and the birds were getting hyper with their singing. The early-sunrise chill was setting in as well, which made Nikita wish that she had worn something warmer than a trench coat over a simple cotton top. No matter. Once those idiots were finished with the examination, she'd be able to go get herself a nice cup of extra-hot white chocolate mocha from the coffee shop by the flat, before heading back home for a hot bath and hopefully a nap. She supposed she should see if Ana was alright before allowing herself to relax. That girl was someday going to be the death of her...that is, if Nikita didn't murder her first. She was an auror; she could probably get away with it.

"Yo," Travis' voice halted Nikita's murder plans. "This might be bigger than we thought."

Nikita raised an eyebrow and motioned for him to continue. Ryan and Dan walked up to them, reforming their little auror circle, and Dan cast another disillusionment charm over them, which meant that Nikita could now release the confused muggles from her grip.

Meanwhile, Travis was talking.

"The thing that killed this man ain't no _avada_. It ain't even a killing curse."

Nikita stared.

"What was it then?" she asked, somewhat perplexed. This was indeed turning out to be an interesting case.

Travis gave a dramatic pause before continuing.

"A sting hex," he replied.

"A sting hex," Nikita repeated, as if looking for confirmation. Murder by a sting - that was unheard of.

"That's right. It wasn't just a sting hex though; it was combined with some other spell. Seems like the combination of the two is quite deadly."

All four aurors stood there for a minute, puzzled, as the muggles got back to work with examining the body.

Dan came out of it first.

"Travis, you go to the lab to get that spell trace examined. Ryan, you follow the victim's background check to see if he had any dealings with the Wizarding community. Nikita, go back to sleep, we'll see you on Tuesday. And don't you dare come in before then," he pointed an accusing finger at her. "We see you enough at the office as it is."

"Yes sir," Nikita nodded. It was useless to argue with the boss.

"Good," he continued. "Now disapparate one at a time please, so that the muggles don't notice our presence. Travis, you first."

One by one, the aurors melted into nothingness.

Nikita apparated into a muggle neighbourhood and headed straight for the coffee shop. Hogan's Alley Café was a wizard-tolerant muggle place, one which Nikita frequented because of its homey atmosphere and close proximity to both the office and the flat. First introduced to her by Ana, who (despite her pureblood heritage) was acquainted with the original owner of the café as well as his son who now ran the business, Hogan's quickly became one of Nikita's daily haunts.

Despite the early hours, Hogan's was open. She entered the shop, wind chimes ringing as the door closed behind her, and approached the counter.

"Hey Jeff," she greeted the familiar barista, who looked up at her and grinned.

"Niks! How are you? We haven't seen you since Monday!"

Nikita shrugged, "I've been busy with work and such. Ana's been crazier than usual too, any idea what's up with her?"

"No…" Jeff trailed off, and then looked up with a thoughtful look on his face. "Actually, I might have some dirt for you. I saw her not a full hour ago, she left about half an hour before you came in."

"Any idea why she was here so early in the morning?"

"Haven't the foggiest. She practically ran in here, ordered the largest cup of our strongest brew, downed it in three gulps without sitting down, slammed some of your wizard coins on the counter, and booked it out of here as though her life depended on it. I was so – oh hello, how may I help you?" Jeff directed his attention somewhere behind her left shoulder, and Nikita realized that someone else had entered the café while they were talking.

She turned to look, and came face to face with none other than a very tall and extremely tired-looking Richard Castle. He looked at her briefly and gave her a nod of recognition, then turned toward the counter.

"I'll take an espresso macchiato please," he told Jeff. "And whatever the lady is having."

Jeff nodded and proceeded to whip up their orders. Throughout her years here, Nikita had always ordered the same drink: a medium cup of extra hot white chocolate mocha, which was why Jeff didn't even bother to ask her if she was having the usual before making her coffee.

"Uh…thanks?" she half questioned the man's action.

"You look like you need it," he explained, grinning, then held out his hand. "Rick Castle."

"Nikita. Nikita Morar," she shook his hand, which felt very warm and solid in comparison to her own clammy palm. She still hadn't completely warmed up from the outside chill. They stood there for a moment in silence.

"So what brings you to a coffee shop at such wee hours of the morning?" he asked, once Jeff handed them each their respective coffee as they had walked over to settle in armchairs by the fire.

"Work," she replied shortly, hoping he wouldn't ask too many questions.

"You're going from work or _to_ work? Or do you work here?" he leaned forward eagerly.

_Wow, three questions in one breath, that's quite impressive_, she thought.

"From work. I was called in for a last minute night shift".

He cringed visibly at the mention of night shifts, but then his curiosity took over once more and he cocked his head to the side as if mentally preparing her for his next question.

"What do you do?"

_Ah, bullocks._

For someone who had spent years interrogating murder suspects, Nikita felt unusually uncomfortable under his intense gaze. It was as if he already knew everything about her and was waiting for an answer to call her out on her bullshit. _But_, she supposed,_ it couldn't be avoided, now could it? _

Although she prided herself in being quite a marvelous liar, she felt compelled to tell him the truth, or at least to come as close to the truth as she dared.

"I'm a cop", she finally said, remembering the swarm of human bees who called themselves the Scotland Yard, huddled around the body a mere few hours ago.

Castle's eyes lit up instantly. _Oh shit._ He was a murder mystery writer, and quite a famous one at that! How the hell did she manage to forget that?! This was right up his alley...and she did NOT want to walk down it.

She could almost see the mountain of questions building up in his head, but to her immense surprise he didn't voice a single one.

"That's a great profession", he noted with a slight smile. "Very rewarding, and a gripping one at that!"

"What are you saying?" she asked against her better judgement.

"Think about it. You practically get to play the part of a superhero team of London. You get to see the most bone-chilling crimes, hear the most thrilling stories, and punish the vilest of evildoers. I sit in my office making up stories, you get to live them!"

His voice was barely more than a whisper, but the excitement in his eyes was quite real. He sat there, nearly bouncing in his seat, like a child who'd been promised their favourite toy for Christmas, and Nikita didn't like that one bit. She knew that murder stories were his life, and he knew nothing of the War, but she couldn't let him remain so confident in his delusions.

Nikita could feel her own facial expression change to one of anger. She leaned forward, so that her palms were resting on the arms of Castle's chair, and looked him straight in the eyes.

"This isn't a game Mr. Castle, nor is it a story. It's murder, it's death. It's horrific and disgusting. I'm not a superhero; I'm a person who does their best to protect this city from devastation. Now if you will excuse me, I have somewhere to be."

And with that she stood, gave him one last once over, and walked out of the cafe without a backwards glance.

_Damn pretentious arse. Who does he think he is anyways?! Waltzing into Hogan's like that. I didn't even hear what Jeff was going to say about Ana...didn't even get to enjoy even a SIP of my coffee, _Nikita thought furiously as she stalked out onto the street.

Right, Ana. She better text Vanessa about that before she forgot..

She reached into her trench coat pocket only to have her hand touch the bare lining. Bloody hell, as if her morning could get any better; she'd left her phone on the coffee table at Hogan's Alley Cafe.

In the company of Richard Castle.


	4. Of Pancakes, Phones, and Superheroes

**Disclaimer: Don't own it. It all belongs to people who actually get money for doing that sorta stuff. Okay I'm done now.**

**Hey folks, sorry for the delay with the chapter. I've been super sick for the past five days, and I had freaking writers block so it took me a while to get it all sorted out.**

**Great thanks to my amazing editor Vanessa (yes, her name is also in the story, shut up, I have no creativity for names) who puts up with the "impatient masses" and stays up till 4am every time to fix up the chapters! All the virtual omelettes in the world go to her!**

**Also a shoutout to the crazy people who constantly bug me about when the next chapter is coming out. You know who you are. **

**Alright, here we go. PLEASE REVIEW, or I'll go insane and kill off all your favourite characters.**

**Other than that, enjoy the chapter! Free virtual Earl Grey tea and ginger biscuits are provided.**

**- Ana**

Nikita entered the apartment and instantly felt the exhaustion from her unexpected early morning encounters creeping through her body. She knew she had to go back to Hogan's to pick up her phone, but she'd do that later in the afternoon once she'd had a nap and something to eat. She walked into the living room, and stopped short at the sight that greeted her.

Ana sat on the sofa, staring absentmindedly at the blank pellyvision (or something) screen and stuffing her face with Cheetos, seemingly in complete disregard of what went on around her.

Nikita looked at her for a good minute, taking in the messy blonde hair, crumpled clothes, and generally disheveled appearance of someone who simply couldn't be bothered to give a damn about anything.

"Your eyes are bright red", Nikita observed, sinking into the armchair nearest to the fire and propping her booted feet up on the coffee table (they really had to stop doing that, the table had already been smashed to pieces and reassembled by magic countless times).

"A wow, ah am Wowd Cowdemowy", Ana nodded as she shovelled another handful of Cheetos into her mouth.

For anyone else, the muddle of sounds through a mouthful of Cheetos would've been indiscernible, but all the years she had spent with her best friend had left her quite fluent in Ana-speak.

"Well my lord, I suggest you get off that couch now and go take a shower. You look filthy." She paused, then continued, "Where the hell have you been anyways?"

Ana grunted in response, but otherwise gave no indication that she was intending to answer the question.

"Well whatever it is, I hope you're being careful," she said, reaching out to pry the bag of Cheetos from Ana's grasp.

Ana made no response, but slumped even deeper into her seat and closed her eyes. Nikita decided to let her be; talking to Ana when she was in this state was a waste of the precious time which could be spent on better things.

Such as sleep.

Nikita stood from her seat, throwing the Cheetos bag on the kitchen countertop as she dragged her feet over to her bedroom and fell on her bed, not bothering to close the door behind her.

It's not like anyone would come into her room anyway.

She would deal with everything later on: the strange stinging murder case, Richard Castle, her damn phone, and Ana. But right now, she _had_ to catch up on some well-deserved sleep. She wouldn't have the mental capacity to even block a simple bat bogey hex at this point.

With all these thoughts running through her mind, Nikita fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Nikita awoke to the smell of freshly brewed coffee wafting through her half open door. It took her a minute to register that she had fallen asleep fully clothed, complete with her heeled boots still on her feet. Despite that, Nikita felt more rested than she had been for the past few weeks.

Nikita got off her bed and rubbed her eyes with her hands in an attempt to shake off the remaining sleepiness.

"Good morning!" came a cheery voice from the doorway.

Nikita turned and found Ana grinning at her, with a plate of steaming pancakes in her hands.

Ana made_ pancakes?_

Noticing Nikita's surprised glance towards the plate, Ana shook her head.

"Vanessa is in the kitchen", Ana explained.

"Oh..."

That would explain it.

In any case, she was glad that Ana had come out of her weird state since she had last seen her.

"Yeah. Anyways, go take a shower and let's go eat breakfast. I'm starving," Ana chirped and skipped her way back to the kitchen.

###

After soaking in the shower for a good half an hour, Nikita headed to the living room, drying her hair along the way with her wand (being a witch really did come in handy at times like these).

She barely had time to sit down on a barstool before a plate of pancakes came flying out of nowhere and landed on the table in front of her, followed by a still grinning Ana with her wand pointed at the plate. An exhausted looking Vanessa completed the procession, carrying three mugs of steaming coffee.

"So tell me," said Ana as she plopped herself down on a vacant barstool and grabbed a pancake off the plate, "how did you manage to sleep for twenty four hours?"

Nikita stared at her for a moment, then whirled her seat around to face the clock on the wall.

"I…what?!"

"Good thing you have a day off, isn't it?" mused Vanessa, also taking a seat at the table. "Whatcha doing today anyways?"

Nikita rubbed her forehead.

"Gotta go back to Hogan's to get my phone, then I'll probably call up the office to see if they've got any leads on the vic".

"I thought Dan told you to stay away from the office until Tuesday if you value your life. Why the hell are you going there today?" Ana pointed an accusing finger in Nikita's direction.

Nikita didn't bother asking how Ana knew these details; she had long suspected that Ana and Dan had some sort of communication going on behind her back, and Ana's complete awareness of what went on in the office only confirmed her suspicions.

Either way, she had to get her phone back before either Hogan or Jeff decided to sell it off to a customer (she'd heard stories about it happening before, as Hogan quite enjoyed messing with the wizarding folk that ventured into his cafe).

"Well, I better get going, or Hogan will start prank calling my boss", she told the girls.

Vanessa laughed at this.

"Last thing we need is Dan showing up on the doorstep, asking for your head," she said as she brought the coffee mug to her lips. "Off you go then!"

Ana shoved a pancake into Nikita's mouth and directed her towards the door before she could utter another word.

"Goodie, I'll get some work done in peace for once", she exclaimed happily as she opened the door and pushed Nikita through it. "And more pancakes too!" she added.

"Yes, because _I'm_ the loud and obnoxious one here," scoffed Nikita in response as she disapparated off the doorstep with a soft _pop_.

###

Hogan's Alley Café was quite the same as she had left it a day ago.

Jeff was much busier though, seeing as it was actually daytime. A couple people sat in the armchairs which she and Castle had occupied before, chatting happily about one thing or other (Nikita caught the word _dragonpox_, immediately followed by _shoes_), and a few more people spread themselves throughout the café, immersed in books or muggle newspapers.

Jeff waved at her as soon as she walked in, and ducked down behind the counter to retrieve something. When he reappeared, he handed her a carefully folded piece of paper.

"Here this is for you - he has your phone," he said, and turned to the elderly lady who was asking him for a vanilla latte.

"Jeff!" Nikita called out, but he waved her off and turned to make the latte.

_Oh well._

She sat down at one of the tables and unfolded the note:

_I'm sorry we got off on the wrong foot today, and since you probably never want to see me again, and I kind of do want to see you again, I made sure to not give you a choice in the matter. Which is why I'm holding your phone hostage at my loft. Come and get it._

_Rick_

_P.S. I'm home practically every day, you won't miss me._

_P.P.S. Jeff gave me the phone himself and said we look like a cool duo. His words, not mine._

Below that was a neatly scribbled address complete with the postal code, and a detailed drawing of a puppy, which he must have laboured on for at least an hour.

The universe must _really_ hate her.

###

Nikita tapped her foot impatiently as she rang the doorbell_. The nerve of him! Why did he think it was okay to just take her phone when he could have just as easily given it to Jeff? And since when was 'you look like a cool duo' an excuse for letting the idiot take away her phone?! Nikita would've hexed Jeff into next Sunday if she wasn't at risk of getting arrested for it. He was bloody lucky to be born a muggle._

Her internal monologue was interrupted by the sound of sharp footsteps behind the closed door, followed by the said door swinging open to reveal an extremely disheveled, yet widely grinning Richard Castle.

_With a gun in his hand._

Unlike muggle cops, Nikita didn't possess the experience of dealing with guns on a daily basis, but gun-handling was part of auror training in case wizard criminals ever decided to use an unconventional way of murder, and Nikita's instincts kicked in before she could properly evaluate the situation.

Which was why three seconds later she found herself expertly situated with her knee on Castle's spine; his hands twisted behind his back in what looked like quite a painful position, and the gun a good few metres away from his reach.

Letting out a breath she didn't know she was holding, Nikita looked up to assess her surroundings, and froze as she found herself staring into a pair of huge, light-blue eyes.

_Shit._

She was looking at a girl of about seven years of age, with auburn curls framing her pale face, her piercing eyes staring at Nikita in frozen shock, and her hand holding a gun that matched the one on the floor.

_Oh._

The girl took a few tentative steps towards Nikita, and suddenly her face split into a wide, mischievous grin.

"Can you hold him down for a few more seconds?" she whispered, pointing her gun at Castle's back.

A muffled, but somewhat urgent _'lemme go!'_ was heard from the lump on the floor, and with that the girl skipped towards the man and pulled the trigger repeatedly, cackling madly as she did so.

Nikita's guard was down for a moment, but that was enough for Castle. He gave a sudden war cry, threw Nikita off his back (she landed on the floor surprisingly painlessly), sprinted his way to the other side of the room, and hid behind a large white sofa before the adorable kid could finish her sudden killing spree.

But the girl was sneaky. Silently, she ducked around the sofa where Castle was crouching and pointed the gun at his back once again.

"Game's over soldier. Surrender or face the wrath of the red side", she said, a maniacal grin spreading over her face.

Castle sighed dramatically, and put his hands up over his head.

"Alright kid, you win this one", he stated with a dramatic sigh. "But mark my words, General Alexis, the blue side will get its revenge soon enough".

"Oh I'm sure," scoffed the girl, "you've been saying that for the past month or so".

"Oh, is that so?" Castle posed, as if for a picture. "Then what do you think of this?"

Alexis tried to make a run for it, but the man was faster.

He picked the squealing kid up, throwing her over his shoulder, and walked over to where Nikita stood where she had collected herself after being thrown a minute earlier.

"Miss Morar, I'd like to introduce you to my daughter Alexis Castle," he stated proudly as he set Alexis back on her feet. "Alexis, Nikita Morar. She's a cop who's back to arrest me for stealing her phone".

"Why did you steal her phone in the first place?" the girl huffed and crossed her arms over her chest, her curls bouncing adorably as she did so. "You even told me not to take things that aren't mine to take".

"It was the only way I could lure her into our lair. Desperate times call for desperate measures, y'know?" he cocked an eyebrow at his daughter.

Alexis sighed exasperatedly and shook her head at her father, then turned to Nikita.

"Don't mind him; he's always annoying like that. Do you want some juice?"

Castle smacked himself in the forehead.

"When did my kid become so polite?!"

Nikita couldn't help but laugh. Even if she was angry with the man, his relationship with his daughter was really one of a kind. However she still had a mission to complete, and if Castle thought this adorable kid was going to soften her resolve, he couldn't be more wrong.

"It's really nice to meet you, Alexis, but I'm afraid I really am here to arrest your father for taking my phone".

Castle took a step back and covered his eyes with his hands.

"Are you actually allowed to do that?" he asked, looking at her through a crack between his fingers.

"Keep my phone hostage any longer, and I'll show you what I can and cannot do," she said menacingly. Then, realizing what she had said, she mentally slapped herself for the unintentional double entendre in her words.

Any normal man would feel uncomfortable in this situation. But apparently not Richard freaking Castle.

"I will have my servants hand you the phone as soon as they reassemble the pieces that I took apart yesterday", he said with a comic bow.

Nikita's lips formed a thin line which (to anyone who really knew her) was an indication of irritation.

"Oh you _better_ be joking", she hissed.

He put his hands up in mock surrender.

"Okay relax there! I don't have servants. We do everything on our own, right Alexis?" he turned to the girl, who was in the middle of a giggling fit.

Nikita couldn't help it. The irritated expression slid off her face immediately, and she smiled at the sight of Alexis wiping her tears of mirth.

"No dad, _I'm_ the one who does everything, you just sit there and watch me," said the girl and stuck her tongue out.

"That's my girl," Castle grinned, then turned to Nikita. "I'll be right back with your phone. You take a seat on the sofa and Alexis will bring you juice".

With that, Castle disappeared behind a door (which Nikita assumed to be his office door), and the girl busied herself in the kitchen. Nikita sat on the white leather sofa in front of the fire and stared into the flames.

She'd seen Richard Castle on the street, in a coffee shop, and in his home. And every time she saw him, he was different.

Their encounter on the streets had left the image of him in her mind as a kind stranger. The time she'd talked to him at Hogan's Alley, he was a disrespectful prick. The Castle she'd met today was perhaps the most difficult to comprehend.

He had a superpower in this house, and that power was to be a dad. A super-dad. A dad who would go to any lengths to ensure that his daughter was happy. And the girl in the kitchen who was currently singing the Circle of Life at the top of her lungs was the perfect example of what Richard Castle was capable of. For that, Nikita admired him.

She leaned back into the cushions of the sofa and looked around. The fire was blazing in the fireplace, sending spots of light dancing around the room. The elegantly furnished living room, combined with the wooden frames which panned the walls was perhaps a bit too fancy for Nikita's taste, but it was offset by the set of pictures on the mantelpiece.

Nikita stood from the sofa to take a closer look, and found herself engrossed into a whole new world. The muggle pictures didn't move, but that was probably what made them so amazing. Unlike magical pictures, they captured a precise moment in time, as if freezing it in a time capsule. And years later you would only remember that single moment, perhaps forgetting all else, but having the movements, the feelings, the texture preserved in your memory.

The pictures were mostly of Alexis, mixed together with pictures of Castle, and a magnificent looking, auburn haired woman, ranging from her mid-twenties to what seemed like mid-fifties in the photos. It took Nikita a minute of concentrating on the photos to realise that the older woman was most likely Castle's mother.

Besides her family, the woman was also photographed with a number of important-looking men in suits and tuxes, who appeared to be honoured by the lady's presence. She'd have to ask Castle about it.

One photo in particular caught Nikita's eye, and she leaned forward to get an even closer look at it. It was the auburn-haired lady, with her hand resting on a gentleman's arm, both smiling warmly at the camera. The man himself was nothing special, with black hair and a somewhat stuck-up look about him, even as he grinned widely. But it only took Nikita a second to recognise the man in the picture as the man whose dead body she had been looking at not a full two days ago.

Oh, she _definitely_ had to ask Castle about this.

"I brought you juice," sang Alexis, as she came into the room laden with a tray of three juice glasses and a jug of orange juice balanced on it.

Nikita crossed the room in three steps and took the heavy-looking tray from the girl's hands, placing it on the coffee table in front of the fire.

"Thank you Alexis, though you really shouldn't be carrying that much weight just yet," she scolded.

_The girl was so fragile looking!_

Alexis laughed.

"Dad and I exercise a lot. You saw us just now, didn't you? Gram says I look small, but I can carry things fine, don't worry", she smiled and Nikita felt some strange sort of warmth that she'd never felt before spreading through her body.

That girl was probably the cutest kid she'd ever seen in her life. Nikita was quite amazed at how eloquent and mature the little girl spoke-she was so young! She almost wanted to hug Alexis, but held back unsure of how that gesture would be received by the girl. Instead, she decided to get some investigation in while she had the time.

"Is that your gram?" she pointed to one of the pictures on the mantelpiece.

The girl nodded.

"Yeah, that's her at one of her shows," she explained. "She's an actress."

"And the man beside her?" Nikita prompted.

Alexis shrugged, and picked up a glass of orange juice from the table.

"Probably some minister or something," she looked uninterested. "The important guys always show up to see her perform. That's why dad and I don't usually go to them, there are lots of media people, and dad doesn't like them much."

Nikita could almost see the headline of half the world's magazines: A world renounced author attends his mother's performance to be on the lookout for the hottest singles in the field.

Yeah, Nikita could see why Castle didn't like them. She could also see why he didn't want to bring Alexis into these things.

Castle half waltzed into the room and held Nikita's phone out to her, which she immediately stuck into her back pocket.

"I'm sorry I made a horrible impression of myself earlier", he told her as he sat down on the opposite sofa beside Alexis. "Perhaps you're right, I don't value human lives enough. I don't bring people into my own life very often, and that is probably why I don't have much compassion in me. But it's never too late to start, is it?"

Nikita felt the sudden urge to say, _I told you so_, as Ana would have done, but she held herself back and nodded, her eyes fixed on the dancing flames within the fireplace.

"Dad is an idiot sometimes", piped up Alexis from the chair next to her. "He tells me that every time he does something wrong".

"Hey!" Castle sounded so offended, that Nikita looked up at him in concern only to find him staring at his daughter with his mouth hanging open in fake disbelief.

The girl just stuck her tongue out at him and grinned, then pointed to the picture on the mantelpiece.

"Nikita was asking about gram's photo. I don't know who the man is".

Both Alexis and Nikita looked at Castle expectantly. He shrugged.

"Can't say I've met him before. He's most likely some minister or other, it's common for them to come to Mother's shows. She's a _biiiiig_ star, that one", he said and picked up his glass of juice.

Nikita ran her hand through her hair dejectedly, a gesture which was observed with full attention by Castle. Finally, she decided to offer them an explanation.

"The man in that photo was found dead a few days earlier, and we're looking into his murder".

Castle perked up, and instantly leaned forward at the sound of the word murder.

"If you'd like, I can ask Mother to relay any details to you. She's out now, doing god-knows-what in this town, but she should be back soon enough…we hope".

Nikita frowned. Getting the information was important to her case, but how much detail did she want to go into with these muggles? The last thing she wanted was to unknowingly put more people in danger by allowing them to meddle in wizarding affairs. But, she thought, interviewing this woman may open up new leads on the case, and Castle seemed eager to help out. He would probably meddle no matter what.

"Alright," she said slowly, as if explaining something to a child. "I'd like to interview your mother about this if at all possible, but you must understand that there's only so much information I can divulge to you about the case, and I expect you to understand if I refuse to answer some of the questions you may have".

To her surprise, Castle grinned.

"Can I still ask the questions even though you might not answer them?"

"Sure, I don't see why not," Nikita shrugged her shoulders. She could already tell that trying to prevent Castle from being involved in any way would prove to be difficult. She wasn't sure what this man wanted exactly; but someone who went to the lengths of holding other people's phone hostage was definitely interested in _something_.

_Hopefully not something malicious..._worried Nikita silently.

"Sweet," Castle's voice broke her thoughts. She looked at him, and his grin got even wider, "Cause I _love_ meddling in other people's business".

_Damn it._


	5. Of Captains, Leads, and Reese

**Disclaimer: if you recognise something, it's probably not mine. I'm brilliant, I'm not brilliant enough to own these things.**

**Sup guys,**  
**Well then, this is it - I have to start killing characters now. And it's all your fault. You brought this upon yourself.**  
**Read and Review or people will keep dying. How will you feel then? **  
**Special thanks to my brilliant editor!**  
**That's all, I think.**  
**Enjoy the chapter!**

**- Ana**

Nikita came home that night long after sunset. She had to walk home instead of apparating, as Castle was hell-bent on him and Alexis walking with her at least partway to her house. After setting up a time to meet Martha Rogers, the famous actress and mother of Rick Castle, they had spent an hour discussing murder mysteries until Rick started muttering something about flesh-eating robots, and Nikita was forced to smack his arm to get him out of his whacky imaginary world.

Overall, Nikita's evening had gone pretty well and she was content to have a lead, however weak it was, on the case.

She entered the flat to find Ana bent over her drawing board, sketching out something which looked suspiciously like a deformed England.

"Did you get your phone back?" Ana asked without looking up from her drawing.

"Yeah, Rick had it," Nikita replied offhandedly.

"Who?"

_Oh right. She'd never told Ana about Castle. _

"Richard Castle, this muggle author I met," she explained.

"You mean the famous murder mystery writer?" the blonde looked up.

"You've heard of him?!" This was a surprise to Nikita - Ana's pureblood heritage didn't usually mix well with anything muggle. She'd only accepted the cell phone after Nikita absolutely refused to use owl post, and even then it took her a year to finally get the hang of it.

"Yeah, I know him," came Ana's reply. "By the way, there's chai on the stove for you."

Nikita shrugged.

"I had no idea that you were aware of muggle authors..." she pondered aloud as she headed for the kitchen. Ana's strangeness had always been an unquestionable thing, even back in their Hogwarts days; by now she'd gotten used to not bothering herself with Ana's antics. If there was something important going on, she knew the girl would come to her for help or advice.

She tapped her wand on the pot to heat up the chai, and decided to check in with the office to see if she was missing anything interesting. The guys rarely left the office till past midnight, so she confidently dialed the number, and wasn't surprised to hear Ryan's voice on the other end three beeps later.

"How is it that you always get away with not listening to Dan? Today is still not Tuesday!" he exclaimed.

"Yes, but _tomorrow_ is Tuesday, and I want to know what's going on beforehand," Nikita shot back. Even Ryan couldn't argue with logic. "Anything on the vic?"

"All we've been able to figure out so far is that the man was a complete muggle. No wizard relations, no knowledge of the wizarding community, and no absolutely no contact with any known wizards throughout his life. How he got himself murdered is beyond me," relayed Ryan.

"Do we have an ID on the guy?"

"Not yet, we're letting the Scotland Yard deal with that actually. We sent a man there undercover; he'll let us know when they've got something," he chuckled. "Poor guy, to have to work with those dunderheads all day long!"

"Since when is trusting the Scotland Yard with something a good idea?" Nikita rolled her eyes at the phone. "I actually think I have a lead on that, I'll let you know as soon as I get the details."

"That's what Dan said about them too, but Travis has a soft spot for those guys. Oh, speak of the devil, Travis wants to talk to you."

There was loud _clang_ on the other end, and then the shuffling sound of the phone being passed from one person to another.

"Yo!" came Travis' rather excited chatter. "How has your day off been? Please tell me you weren't thinking of coming into the office."

"I was actually," she laughed, "but Ana warned me that Dan was in a bad mood and would likely have my head if he came in."

"Nah, he wouldn't get rid of his star auror when there's such an important murder to solve. Just listen to this!" Travis paused dramatically, then piped up once more. "The spell our killer used isn't in the system. Have _you_ ever heard of an unregistered killing curse, cause I haven't!"

"You're kidding," said Nikita as she poured her chai into a mug and took a sip. "Unregistered killing curse?!"

"That's right. We figure out what it is – we will have one good-ass lead on this thing. If we don't, we don't got nothin'."

"Well then," Nikita poured the rest of her chai down the sink and glanced at the clock, "It's past midnight, I'm coming in."

With that she hung up, grabbed her leather jacket off the hook, and disapparated off the doorstep just as she heard Ana's phone ring inside the apartment.

###

She was met at the office entrance by Dan, who had his arms crossed in front of his chest and wore an expression that would've made anyone else cower. But Nikita, who had known the man for far too long to be intimidated by his glares, just smiled and patted him on the shoulder in greeting.

"It's Tuesday," she said, and pushed past him into the room.

Dan gave an indiscernible grunt and followed her in, shutting the door behind them. The office was rather small, with four tables connected to one another in the middle of the room, and a three wall long murder board lining three quarters of the room. The fourth wall held a floor to ceiling one way mirror and a door that lead into the interrogation room.

But for now, that room was quiet and empty. They had no suspects, no evidence, no leads, and that was the most uncomfortable feeling in the world for Nikita. The feeling of no direction was suffocating. With only a clear destination in mind but no roads _leading_ to that destination, the team was feeling quite lost. Or, in Dan's case, angry.

"So how do we find the man who cast a curse that ain't even supposed to exist in the first place?" Travis stood in front of the middle panel of the murder board, his eyes practically burning holes in the word _curse?_ written on it in red ink.

"We separated the curse from the sting hex and figured out its actual casting light, but we can't find the origin. The curse itself is this delicate lilac colour with a tint of turquoise," supplied Ryan.

Nikita opened her mouth to comment, but Dan beat her to it.

"With your intricate knowledge of shades and colours you could make a career as a wedding planner Ryan," he smirked.

Ryan didn't even look his way.

"Only if I get to plan your wedding, dear Captain," he shot back.

Dan chuckled. It was common knowledge that the man, despite his young age (he was a year above Nikita), lived exclusively for his work and no woman would ever be able to compete with that. Dan's wedding was something the team joked about on a daily basis, and the man had long stopped caring about their remarks on his lifestyle.

"I think I may have an idea," said Travis as he picked up a felt pen from his desk and joined Ryan at the murder board. "We know that it's a relatively new spell which hasn't been used very many times, otherwise our system would've picked it up. Spell making is a delicate business that requires some rare talent. So to find out what the curse is and how it operates, we gotta look for a spell-maker who can give us some info on this".

He circled _curse?_ with his marker, drew an arrow to the side and added _spell-maker_ below it, then turned to Dan for confirmation.

Dan's facial expression was a mix of surprise and relief. These prospects of a new lead were something he lived for – a fact which Nikita found both funny and sad at the same time.

"While we're at it we should also contact a Gringotts curse-breaker to see what they know about killing curse combinations," suggested Ryan. "Where do we find this spell-maker of yours anyway?"

Travis shrugged, and immediately Dan's face fell and he slumped back into his seat, looking utterly defeated.

"Oh _goddammit_ Captain, pull yourself together!" Nikita rolled her eyes. "I believe you're in need of a vacation, your face tells me you haven't had a single day off for the past five years".

"Four and a half," muttered Dan and got off his chair. "Alright, let's get this lead sorted out. There's really only one place where we can uncover hidden spell-making talents, and if I'm not mistaken, we are all very much acquainted with it".

"Dan, you are a bottomless pit of hidden brilliance," was Ryan's praise. "Probably the reason you're Captain."

Dan glared.

"My brilliance is quite evident, thank you very much," he said. "Now which of you can get themselves into Hogwarts without attracting attention of the Daily Prophet?"

At his words, all three aurors lifted their hands simultaneously, and grinned at each other. Dan scrunched up his eyebrows in confusion, and then his face morphed into an expression of realisation.

"You just want to see Katie, don't you?" he laughed.

"It's been a whole year Captain since we last saw her! We miss the girl, and she's probably bored to death with all those kids," stated Travis and waved his arms around in an _isn't it obvious_ sort of manner.

"Alright, relax you three, you can go see her. Be careful though, her anonymity is key! You give her away, we pretty much gotta rebuild the structure of the Wizarding World".

"Katie's a metamorphmagus, I think anonymity is the last thing we gotta worry about here", laughed Ryan.

"Constant vigilance, as Mad-Eye used to say," quoted Dan. "You can never be too careful when chasing criminals."

Nikita watched this exchange with amusement. She really loved her team; they were a great bunch with a great sense of humour and sharp minds. Nikita couldn't imagine a life for herself which they weren't a part of. She saw them as her family, except perhaps Dan, whose good looks had been the talk of Hogwarts for all seven years he'd spent there, and which were partly the reason for her enormous schoolgirl crush on him back in sixth year. She was quite over it now, and despite the occasional lurch her stomach gave every time he shot her one of his rare smiles (which she wrote off as a natural reaction to a good-looking man), she was quite capable of staying focused on her work. And now Dan was proposing a trip to Hogwarts. That, she could easily deal with.

"Well, Captain," she said as she pushed herself away from the desk she had been leaning on, "I hardly think being placed at Hogwarts as an undercover security agent counts as catching criminals. I believe our dear Katie has spent the past year brewing sleeping drafts, spiking the Gryffindor table's drinks with them, and then taking off points for sleeping in class. She's surprisingly evil, that one."

"And that is _exactly_ why we love her." exclaimed Travis, then he turned to Dan. "So, Supreme Ruler of Wizarding Law Enforcement, when can we go back to our lovely school to free it from the terrible reign of Katie the Slytherin?"

Dan threw his hands up in the air and gave an exasperated sigh.

"Will you _please_ get some real work done while you're on that righteous mission of yours?! Besides, I think you should let Katie's methods be. The Gryffindors were always a rather annoying bunch, I don't blame her for wanting to shut the little buggers up."

"Said like a true Slytherin," grinned Ryan. "I'll set up a date with the Potions Master, meanwhile you guys focus on other leads such as the curse-breaker scenario for one."

_Leads_. That triggered Nikita's memory.

"Right, about that," she said, looking over at Dan. "I have a potential lead that might be able to get us some more background info on our vic. I can't promise it'll lead us to the killer, but perhaps we'll get a better idea of what we're dealing with."

Dan grinned widely, which caused Nikita's breath to catch in her throat. _Damned hormones._

"Sounds good, Niks. At this point, anything even remotely related to the murder is a good start. Considering the fact that, y'know, we have barely anything to go off of right now."

"Alright guys, let's get some rest now, you've all been here for way too long," Dan stated, as he turned his attention to the rest of the crew. "Off you go, _all_ of you!"

As Nikita disapparated, she heard the snippets of conversation (probably Ryan muttering something about Dan needing to rest as well), but it was soon drowned out by the wheezing sound of being pulled through a tunnel-like space.

###

Nikita stood outside Richard Castle's loft, unsure of herself for probably only the third time in her life. Although (being a half-blood) she was well acquainted with muggles, she was afraid she wouldn't be able to control herself, and would somehow end up giving herself away as a witch. It was quite an irrational fear, seeing as she'd been trained for dealings with muggles, and she could easily undo the damage with a simple memory charm.

Although there was something about the prospect of erasing a part of Rick Castle's memory that made Nikita feel uneasy, she realised that entering that house was inevitable. They were waiting for her, and it was her duty to do her job to the best of her ability. With these thoughts in mind, Nikita rang the doorbell, and immediately heard light footsteps coming towards the door, which then opened to reveal a very grumpy-looking Alexis.

"Alexis! What's wrong?!"

The girl rolled her eyes.

"Dad's been stuck in his office for hours and he won't come out even though he knows you're supposed to be coming over. He's in there," she pointed to a closed door beyond one of the wood-paneled walls, "Muttering about monkeys actually."

"Do you think I should…uh – leave?" questioned Nikita uncertainly.

"Oh no!" exclaimed the girl. "You're not leaving until you help me get him outta there. Gram is coming in an hour, and I really can't deal with two insane people for an entire day."

"Monkeys, you say?" Nikita grinned. She was up for a challenge.

"Yeah, go make him stop", Alexis directed Nikita towards the door, and kicked it hard with her foot before skidding away into the kitchen.

"Stooooooooop," came a whiny voice from behind the closed door. "I'm busy!"

"Castle? Could you come out for a moment?"

Nikita hoped that her presence would get the man out of his state, but apparently she was wrong, as the next thing she heard from the door was a whiny _"I don't wannaaa."_

"Well in that case, please let me in. I don't quite fancy having conversations with doors, no matter how pretty they are".

A loud sigh came from behind the door, followed by the sound of a rolling chair, and then a _click_ of the lock. Nikita pushed down on the handle, and the door swung open, revealing to the auror what being a writer really entailed.

Candy wrappers and crumpled pieces of paper were strewn all over the office floor, the coffee machine in the corner of the room was making grumbling sounds as it spat out splashes of dark coffee into an enormous _World's Best Dad_ mug. A box of donuts stood to the side of a huge oak table, right beside a rough sketch of a hippo playing a ukulele, and stacks upon stacks of books rose up from the floor, some looking quite ready to topple over. In the middle of all this mayhem, on a comfortable-looking leather chair sat none other than Rick Castle with his hands folded behind his head, and his eyes closed.

"Writers block?" guessed Nikita as she assessed the surroundings.

"Oh shut up," groaned Castle, covering his face with his hands.

"Well you clearly have a peculiar way of dealing with it," she chuckled in response.

"That's the thing though, I'm not dealing with it! I don't know how to deal with it!" he raised his hands up in the air to emphasize his words.

Nikita frowned. Knowing how to deal with writers block was something published writers were supposed to be experts at.

"You're a world class author, not to mention a cocky bastard; surely you've encountered that problem before."

Castle snorted.

"You'd think I have, but I really haven't had it before. Thanks for the compliment though," he winked.

"It wasn't meant as one," she smirked. "Now get out of this room and eat something, the block will pass soon enough...you just need to relax a bit."

"Alright alright," he grumbled and made a motion to get up, but then suddenly sat back down and looked over at the door. "Is my mother here?!"

Nikita laughed.

"No, but she will be in about an hour, according to Alexis."

"Oh well then we still have some time." He stretched in his seat, yawned, and rubbed his eyes with his fists.

_So much like a kid,_ thought Nikita.

"Come on-get up!" she told him. "Alexis has been waiting for you since morning."

As if on cue, the office door opened a touch further, and the young girl walked into the room, carrying an enormous bar of Reese chocolate. Castle's eyes grew wide.

"Either you get out and help me before Gram comes home, or the Reese gets it. The choice is yours," Alexis threatened.

Castle paled. Nikita instantly realised that Reese was not something to be joked about in this house if you wanted to keep Richard Castle sane. Or at least as sane as Richard Castle got.

"Put the Reese back," he whispered. "Please."

Alexis smirked evilly.

"Are you going to take a break from destroying your office if I do?"

But Castle wasn't listening anymore. He got off his seat, swiftly walked towards Alexis, and snatched the Reese out of her hand.

"You are _not_ permitted to touch!" he exclaimed as he carried the chocolate out of the room victoriously.

Nikita and Alexis looked at each other and grinned. Whatever his deal was with the Reese, they'd successfully gotten the stubborn man out of his cave.

"Shall we make food? How do you all feel about homemade mac and cheese?" asked Rick when they'd shut the office door behind them. "It'll be ready just in time for my mother's arrival."

"Sure," Nikita shrugged. "Although with the amount of time we just spent trying to get you to leave your office, I doubt you'll be able to get anything done before she gets here."

As if to prove Nikita's point, the front door swung open and the sound of heels clicking against the wooden floorboards filled up the room.

Immediately, Castle was at the door, taking the coat off the very same majestic-looking lady Nikita had seen in the mantelpiece photos. For a second, Nikita thought the woman looked somewhat snobby and stuck-up, but when a warm smile lit up her face, Nikita knew she was quite wrong in her initial impression.

"The great Martha Rogers," introduced Castle grandly. "My mother and world's favourite Broadway actress."

"So you're the cop he's been telling me about. It's nice to finally meet you dear, "said Martha Rogers, as she shook Nikita's hand. "My son really doesn't deserve people like you in his life, seeing as he's been waddling around without purpose for the past few years of all his existence."

Rick scoffed, seemingly offended by his mother's words, but put on an innocent smile the second she turned to him.

"Thank you for the compliments mother. I'm sure Miss Morar here is quite enlightened by this new information," he said sarcastically.

"Very much so Mr. Castle, "grinned Nikita. "Although I think I'm more surprised by your strange relationship with Reese."

"Reese? Is that a woman's name?" Martha Rogers scrunched up her nose, then realisation hit her and she groaned. "Please tell me you're not talking about the stupid chocolate bar! If he buys another one of those Reese boxes, we'll be bankrupt!"

"So what, I like chocolate, big deal!" cried Castle.

Martha waved her hand.

"Oh no dear, there's a difference between liking chocolate, and obsessively stuffing your face with it for the past three years, "she exclaimed. "Allergies and diabetes are most definitely in your near future."

Rick grumbled something indiscernible, which sounded suspiciously like _'I'm an adult now, I can do whatever I please!'_

"If I have to de-Reese-ify the house again, I'll be increasing my allowance from your bank account," said Martha sternly. "Mark my words."

"Fine," retorted Castle. "Why don't you and Nikita have your chat while I go finish making you dinner, and then we'll eat something other than sarcasm?"

"Fine by me," said Martha, and clicked her way into the sitting room. Nikita followed her, no longer feeling any sort of discomfort she had been earlier.

"So, Richard tells me you want to know something about the poor murdered man from one of my pictures?" Martha asked as she sat down on one of the white sofas. Nikita sat across from her on the loveseat.

"Yes," she said. "I just need to ask you few questions for our investigations, if you don't mind."

"Of course not dear, what is it that you would like to know more about?"

"Thank you. The man in the third picture from the right, who was he?" Nikita pulled out a small notepad and went to grab her favourite ink-filled quill, before stopping short. Cursing herself silently for her near slip up, she quickly reached for her pen instead.

Martha looked over at the mantelpiece, and brought her hand up to her neck somewhat nervously.

"Marcus Grimler," she stated, "The British Minister of Finance, and a generous sponsor of mine. We've known each other for quite a few years now. It's a great loss, his death."

"I'm very sorry," said Nikita. "Do you know why he might have been a target? Were there any strange things going on in his life, perhaps some occurrences you couldn't explain?"

Martha shook her head.

"No, he was a peaceful man who loved his job more than anything else. He didn't have enemies, and nothing extraordinary happened to him as far as I know. His death was a shock to all of us in the industry; we have no idea who could've wanted him dead and for what reasons".

"Is there anything else you can tell me?"

Martha leaned forward an inch, and Nikita could sense some sort of urgency in her tone.

"Only that I hope you bring the ones responsible to justice soon enough. No one's safe in our world,_ no one_. And despite my motherly worries about diabetes and slothing around, I'm quite a bit smarter than I look. His background is impeccable, but the way he died wasn't normal or conventional in any way, and I think _that_ is really what you should be looking into."

Nikita nodded. Martha really was smarter than she had seemed at the first glance, and Nikita's respect for the elder woman increased exponentially with every word that came out of her mouth.

"Thank you Martha, "she said, and stood up.

"Anytime dear," smiled the woman, also getting up and leading the way out of the room.

She paused before opening the door and looked back at Nikita.

"I think my son needs to learn some manners," she whispered, and swung the door open abruptly.

A loud _Ouch!_ followed by a string of rather unflattering swear words was heard from the corner behind the door as Castle stumbled out rubbing his forehead where the door had hit him.

"And that," said Martha," Is what you get for eavesdropping on private conversations."

Nikita, who had never seen Rick Castle look so embarrassed and pleased at the same time, doubled over in laughter.

Martha was chuckling to herself, and Alexis, who had come out of the kitchen wearing a cute orange apron, was giggling uncontrollably at her father's antics.

Castle's demeanour fell as he cracked a smile, and soon joined in laughing with the three of them. This contagious laughter was something Nikita rarely experienced. The feeling of joy spread through her body as she clutched her sides and laughed even harder, remembering Rick's embarrassed face and uncertain expression. This was what family was supposed to be like – carefree and mirthful, full of laughter and happy tears.

The annoying ring of Nikita's phone interrupted the moment, and she reached into her pocket to get it, wiping tears from her eyes with her other hand.

"Hello?" she put the phone to her ear, a smile still on her face. She could almost feel Castle's eyes piercing her skull inquisitively.

"Niks, come down to the office right now, it's urgent," came Dan's desperate voice.

Nikita's smile fell from her face.

"What's wrong?"

An audible heavy sigh was heard on the other end as the Captain collected his words.

"There's been another murder".


	6. Of Pessimism and Surprises

**Disclaimer: add this to the list of things I don't own.**

**Howdy,**  
**So here's chapter 6 - it's a little shorter than the previous few chapters, but I think you'll like it.**

**Also, I have an announcement to make. I'm going to be out of town for a while, but I have a few chapters written in advance, so I'll get my editor to put up a new chapter each week and that way the story won't go cold.**

**A random shoutout to my reader from Sri Lanka - I don't know you, but I think you're cool.**  
**And thanks to Vanessa for fixing everything that needed fixing!**

**Read and REVIEW please!**

**- Ana**

Within minutes of the phone call, Nikita found herself standing inside the office once more, watching as Dan seemed to age with every passing minute. Ryan and Travis were both sitting on the floor below the middle panel of the murder board with coffees in hand, glaring at the opposite wall in anguish.

_Another murder. _

It wasn't just any murder either: the victim – a thirty-something blonde woman – was killed in the exact same way as Marcus Grimler. She was also found to be exceptionally muggle with no connections to the Wizarding World whatsoever, which was why Dan was now on the verge of ripping out his hair in frustration.

"What do we do Captain?" asked Travis in a dead voice.

Dan shrugged.

"There's nothing _to_ do, we have nothing but the things we've already decided upon."

Nikita rolled her eyes. _What a bunch of pessimists_.

"We've got enough to go on for now," she told the team. "Just think about it, we know the two murders are directly connected – it's more than likely that both vics were murdered by the same person. We have a lead on the spell and we have Grimler's background check. What we need now is to do a background check on the second victim to see if there was any connection between the two of them, and then we see where that takes us, and decide where to go from there."

"Straight to the pub is where _I'll_ be going" muttered Dan.

"Niks is right," said Travis, scratching his chin which had sprouted dark brown stubble – a souvenir of their stressful schedules and lack of free time.

Clearly, the case was getting to all of them; even the usually well put together Ryan was now chewing on his quill, his shirt partially untucked from his trousers and his normally neatly gelled hair was now standing up on his head in a disheveled mess.

"Alright, I'll take on the new background check, you guys figure out what's going on at Hogwarts," decided Ryan. "Oh and Captain," he saluted Dan, "Get some rest, will ya? We're sick and tired of your grim expression."

Dan squinted at the man on the floor as if trying to vapourize him on the spot, but apparently decided not to protest because a few seconds later he was already shooting out orders to the team:

"Ryan - do a background check on the lady vic, Travis - contact Katie to set up a Hogwarts date, and Nikita - get us a curse breaker before one of us gets killed by that spell. Any questions?"

It was probably a bad idea, but Nikita couldn't help herself. She raised her hand.

"I've got a question, Captain Grumpy."

Dan frowned at her words, but still motioned for her to continue.

"What the hell are you gonna be doing while the three of us get the work done?"

The Captain's face darkened slightly and he rocked back and forth on his heels, looking straight at Nikita with his coal black eyes. Nikita's heart sank under his trained interrogation glare. She'd pissed him off.  
_Shit._

But Dan's glare died as quickly as it appeared.

"I've got lots to do on this case," he replied quietly. "More than you'd ever imagine. One more related murder, and we're looking at a loose serial killer. I need to keep people safe. Which is why all three of you will now turn around, and get to your assignments without any further comments on my contribution to this case."

Nikita always thought it was somewhat unfair that with only one year of experience on her, Dan was of a higher rank within the team. But perhaps it was this determination and unending sense of responsibility that had gotten Dan his Captaincy. His words were in no way a morale booster, yet it had an immediate uplifting effect on the team.

There was a killer on the loose, and they were responsible for keeping their people safe. They had to get to work before any more innocent lives were taken. It was their duty as aurors.

"You'll have your curse breaker by tomorrow sir," she told Dan. Nikita was glad her task was a relatively easy and straightforward one. It wouldn't take long for her to find a man at Gringotts who was trained in the art of curse breaking. She sighed heavily – another long night.

Giving a last wave to her teammates, she disapparated back to the flat.

###

After a good night's sleep and a cup of strong coffee, Nikita took a short morning trip to Gringotts to set up a meeting with the curse breaker. Although she had dealt with much worse, the goblins never failed to send a cold shiver down her spine; but at least she had found an exceptional curse breaker for Dan and that's all that mattered. By early afternoon, Nikita found herself back in her living room, facing a sight which rather scared her.

Ana was passed out on the couch with an empty 2L bottle of vodka and a half empty jar of pickles on the coffee table in front of her.

_When had she gotten home? Why was she like this? What the _hell_ had happened? _

As Nikita tried to deduce more of what happened as she stared at her friend, Ana's eyes suddenly flew open and she stared back.

"What?" she asked in a somewhat hoarse tone.

Nikita raised her eyebrows.

"This," she pointed to the coffee table. "You okay?"

Ana's eyes followed her movements.

"Oh _that_," she half smiled, "There was only half a bottle in there to begin with, don't worry. I'm perfectly fine."

"You're drinking in the _morning_, and that's a sign that something's going on. You've been acting really weird lately, and it's starting to worry me. Now, I'm asking this _once_: what's wrong?" Nikita's stare turned into somewhat of a glare.

Ana shrugged, not quite looking her in the eye, but didn't answer. Nikita's hard exterior gave way and she sat down at the foot of the couch.

"You know, it won't kill you to share, right?" she asked quietly.

"No, it wouldn't kill me," Ana agreed.

"Then tell me what's going on," Nikita prodded.

Ana opened her mouth, but quickly shut it again and ran a hand through her messy hair.

"It's just…work stuff," she said uncertainly.

"Care to elaborate?"

"No," came the answer.

Nikita knew it was useless to push. Ana was stubborn to begin with, and now she _really _didn't want to confide what was going on.

"Well then," Nikita said, "Let's get you out of this state. How do you feel about mac and cheese? I'll make us some."

Ana looked up and gave a slight smile.

"Extra cheese?"

Nikita grinned back and headed for the kitchen.

Mac and cheese was perhaps one of the easiest meals to ever have been invented by humankind, and Nikita certainly took full advantage of that. The macaroni cupboard was located right next to Ana's coffee cupboard, and was stacked top to bottom with all brands and sizes of mac and cheese. Although it wasn't the healthiest option, it worked for two people who barely ever ate at home, and was a decent comfort food for whenever one of them was upset with something.

Nikita picked a box at random (they were all extra cheesy at Ana's insistence) and poured the contents into a saucepan and almost dropped it when her phone vibrated loudly where she had placed it on the countertop by the stove.

After taking out her wand and securely levitating the heavy pan, Nikita looked over at the caller ID and scrunched up her eyebrows in confusion, but clicked _answer_ anyways and put the phone to her ear.

"Yes?" she asked in a stern tone.

"Hey there!" came a cheery voice from the other end.

_What the hell?!_

"Castle?!" she almost shouted into the phone. "Since when do you have my phone number? And do you have any idea how strange it is to be getting a phone call from someone named _General Death_? How'd you even think of that?"

The voice on the phone chuckled.

"We'll I'm quite a bit better at murder than you are, I think we both know that now, don't we?"

"Fake murder perhaps," grinned Nikita. "Or maybe you killed a mosquito or two in your life, I hope you hid their bodies well. Wouldn't want to get arrested for that."

"Don't worry, you'll never find any bodies," he laughed, then his tone became serious. "Anyways, the reason I'm calling is to invite you out for coffee. Alexis said she has a surprise for us, but she won't show me unless you're there too. Quite unfair, really."

"Let me guess, your curiosity can't handle the suspense built up by a seven year old."

"My daughter's surprises tend to be amazing," he scoffed, "Of course I can't wait to see it!"

Nikita ran her hand through her hair, dissolving any knots she came across and sighed exasperatedly.

"When do you want me there?"

She could hear Castle's triumphant grin in his voice.

"Hogan's Alley Cafe, tonight at six?"

"Will do. The coffee's on you though."

"I didn't expect any less from such a polite lady like you," he teased. "I'll see you there."

Nikita hung up the phone and leaned against the countertop, pondering on the new information she'd just received.

Alexis wanted Nikita to see the surprise she'd made for her father_. Why? Why did it matter to the girl that a cop she'd met through her father was going to be there?_

Nikita didn't have the answers to her own questions, so she shrugged and stored them in the back of her mind for later investigation. That concept wasn't anything new to her.

_Why did she feel the need to have all the answers anyways?_ She usually blamed it on her job, but in the back of her mind she knew there was something else prodding her to get her questions answered. Her inquisitiveness came naturally, which fit in well with her job as an auror. But even before that, ever since she learned how to _say_ "Why?", it was the one inquiry she asked regardless of the situation.

Nikita's life had been filled with unanswered questions. Questions that seemed so simple in form, but carried the complexities too great for her alone to unravel. Questions such as, _why aren't my parents with me?_ made for heavy burdens upon her shoulders; so she had made her way through life wanting explanations and clarifications of everything she encountered.

Her only consistent answer that seemed to be applicable time and time again however, was simply: life is unfair.

She was reminded of this daily: through looking at the lifeless faces of murder victims, and into the devastated eyes of their family members. Life wasn't fair, which was why she did her best to bring justice to those in need of it. That was her job.

Nikita shook her head once more and sighed at her thoughts. She always got into the philosophical crap whenever she wasn't feeling well.

Nikita glanced at the clock on the stove as she levitated the saucepan to the countertop. She had about two hours before she was to meet Rick and Alexis at Hogan's, and she would use this time to relax.

###

When Nikita strolled into Hogan's two hours later, she was met by a running hug from an excited redheaded girl.

"Hello Alexis," Nikita laughed as she hugged the girl back.

Another second later, both her and Alexis were enveloped into a strong pair of arms.

"Group hug!" yelled Castle, then mumbled quietly in her ear, "You two looked adorable and I didn't wanna miss out, so I joined in."

Nikita felt herself blush, and couldn't help but laugh. The Castles really did know how to warmly greet people in their unique ways. Finally, she detached herself from the wild group hug and took a step back. Castle put a hand on his daughter's shoulder.

"It's good to see you too guys," Nikita couldn't help grinning widely at the sight of the two of them standing side by side. Castle wore a pair of jeans and a grey sweater, while Alexis was cute as ever in a cream cardigan and plum coloured corduroys. Both were wearing identical expressions of comic disbelief of the fact that she had disengaged from their hug.

Within seconds, Castle's expression changed to a wide grin.

"Let's get a table, shall we?"

"I thought we're in a coffee shop, not a furniture store," mocked Nikita.

"Oh, shut it."

A few minutes later, Nikita found herself sitting at one of Hogan's tables, completely at ease. It was something that didn't happen very often, seeing as constant vigilance and alertness had been drilled into her head during auror training; she couldn't seem to quite shake off even when she was off duty.

"Alexis, you said there was a surprise for me," Castle said, rocking back and forth on two chair legs.

The girl grinned.

"It's not just your surprise, Nikita is part of it too," she said as she put her Koala backpack on the table and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. "I drew a picture of you."

Castle eagerly grabbed the paper out of Alexis' outstretched hand and unfolded it, anticipation evident on his face. Immediately his eyes widened and he blinked a few times, as if to check if there was a problem with his eyesight.

"It's from when I first met Nikita," explained Alexis. "Remember when she took your gun?"

"Oh," Castle went back to staring at the picture, and Nikita noticed that the tips of his ears turned slightly red.

"Lemme see!" she snatched the paper out of Rick's hand, and saw right away what had shocked him.

It was a very detailed drawing of Castle's loft, specifically the corridor area where the coats were kept. On the front plan were Rick and herself, also very well drawn and shaded in all the right places. The kid was a rather good artist for her age; however the reason which had turned Rick's ears red was that Alexis had drawn the precise moment when Nikita had tackled Castle in order to disarm him. The Nikita in the picture was straddling the man on the floor, who (by the unintentional mistake of the seven year old artist) was facing upwards – opposite to the direction he had been facing when the moment had happened in real life.

"Pay special attention to the shading on your coat, it's rather good I think," piped up Alexis on her left.

Nikita opened her mouth to compliment the girl, but laughter suddenly burst out of her.

Alexis paled, with a wounded expression on her face.

"You don't like it?"

Nikita frantically waved her arms around to indicate that she did like the drawing, but Castle beat her in the speaking department.

"Oh don't worry kiddo," he grinned, "She most definitely _loves_ it. More than you know."

The girl smiled, pleased with the feedback, and took out another piece of paper and crayons from her backpack. Nikita finally regained her ability to speak, but felt that a kick under the table would be a more appropriate response to Castle's comment.

"OW! What was that for?!" he exclaimed. "You know everything I said is absolutely true."

"Like hell it is," she laughed again. "Also, I was promised coffee."

"I will get right on that then, shall I? Before you cripple me or something."

With that, Castle got up and headed to the counter where Jeff was busy with a long line of customers.

"A white chocolate mocha, please," Nikita called out after him. Castle turned to make a dramatic act of rolling his eyes. Nikita chuckled.

Alexis looked up from her drawing and stared questioningly from Nikita to her father's empty seat.

"He'll be right back," explained Nikita, "He's gone to get coffee."

The girl nodded, and then turned in her seat to fully face Nikita.

"Can I show you something?" she asked. "I actually haven't even showed dad yet, I'm not sure what he would think of it. But you won't get scared, will you? You're a cop!"

The girl's expression was so serious that Nikita couldn't help but feel both intrigued and somewhat honoured by her trust.

"Of course you can show me, I promise I won't be scared," she said.

Alexis smiled at her thankfully, and took out a third sheet of paper from her backpack.

"I was at a book signing with dad a while ago, and usually I draw there, but that time I forgot my crayons at home," she explained. "I took out my paper anyway and just ran my fingers across it. And look what happened."

She put her hand down on the paper and began tracing various shapes on the page, not taking her eyes off Nikita as she did this. For a few seconds, nothing happened. Then, as if somebody was following the girl's movements with a brush, strokes of paint began to appear on the page in the exact same shapes which she'd drawn moments earlier.

"I don't know how I do it," exclaimed Alexis. "It's like . . . magic."

"I think..." Nikita paused for a moment, "I think that's exactly what it is."

Alexis Castle, daughter of a muggle murder mystery writer, was a witch.


	7. Of Leads, Masters and Insecurity

**Disclaimer: Yeah right...**

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**I have no blurb today, so just read and review please :D**  
**Love you guys (but only if you review)!**

**Enormous THANK YOU to my editor for doing so much work on this while I'm away exploring the world.**

**-Ana**

The next morning, Nikita awoke with a slight feeling of unease in her chest. She stretched, sat up, and looked over at her alarm clock. 6am. _Why the hell was she even awake at this hour?_

She'd gotten home quite late the night before; they had stayed at Hogan's well into the evening, discussing _anything_ that didn't relate to Alexis and her drawing abilities. When she had arrived back at the flat, Nikita had made sure nobody would disturb her until morning, which had included an angry text to Dan about how he's not to bother her with any more murders until the next day. But despite all her preventative measures, she was now wide awake on her own accord, while half the world was still in dreamland.

A flood of guilt washed over her just then, and Nikita suddenly remembered why she was feeling that way. Alexis was a witch-but Nikita didn't have the heart to tell Castle. _How would she have approached it? How would one tell a complete muggle, however easygoing he may be, that his daughter was a witch? What if he didn't take it well?_ Muggle-born witches often faced rejection from their muggle relatives; that much Nikita knew. _What if Rick's opinion of Alexis changed based on her nature?_ She knew he adored his daughter, but it'd been known to happen in the strongest and happiest of families which then often spiraled out into cases of abuse which the auror department had to deal with nearly on a daily basis. This belonging to different worlds would prove a tough challenge for the Castles.

Nikita's phone rang then, breaking her out of her thoughts. Clearly Dan was crap at following instructions from others. Yawning, she reached a hand towards her phone and answered the call on speaker.

"What is it Dan?" she asked tiredly.

"Besides the fact that you should've been in the office about an hour ago, it's nothing really," he replied sarcastically.

"Why would that be? I thought I had a day off," Nikita scrunched up her eyebrows in confusion. Then, it hit her. "Oh right, the cursebreaker meeting. I'll be there in twenty."

"That's more like it," chuckled Dan. "I'll see you in twenty then."

###

Just as she had promised her boss, exactly twenty minutes later Nikita was sitting in an armchair in the corner of the auror office, across from a man with a face that could only be described as murky. His hooded figure was somewhat unnerving and Nikita noticed Ryan and Travis both keeping their wands within their easy reach, which made her feel a bit more secure.

She cleared her throat.

"Master Langdon," she said, "I'd like to ask you a few questions regarding a killing curse we've encountered on one of our murder investigations. Despite all our efforts, we haven't been able to place the curse and it's vital that we know what it is to be able to figure out who may have cast it. Can you help us?"

The man gestured for her to continue, his eyes flashing dangerously under his hood in the dim light of the office. Nikita almost took out her wand as a defensive reflex, but thought better of it.

"Thank you. Here we have a description of the curse," she handed the cursebreaker a sheet with spell details on it. "And here's how the murder happened . . ."

Nikita was about to start into the description of the murder scene, but the man stopped her with a wave of his hand.

"The lilac and turquoise combination suggests a foreign spell – most likely ancient magic," he said in a low raspy voice. "However the curse contains a double incantation which is a relatively new spellmaker invention. I'll even go as far as to say that the original maker of this curse is still alive, perhaps even quite young since such a spell could only have been created by a strong and extremely talented mind."

"What sort of person should we be looking for?" asked Ryan uncertainly over Nikita's shoulder.

The man looked up to face him.

"You should seek a young witch or wizard, likely in their early twenties, with exceptional talent in wandless magic, who is possibly a foreigner or has connections to foreign culture," the man spoke quietly, but confidently, and with an air of superiority about him.

"Well that's specific," muttered Dan sarcastically from the opposite side of the room, where he was recording the conversation on a muggle recording device.

"If you want specificity, you'll have to ask an arithmancer, Mr. Hayes," snapped the cursebreaker at the Captain, who didn't bat an eye at the remark and instead went to collect the curse detail from the hooded man.

"Do you have any last comments to make?" Dan asked as he snatched the clipboard out of the cursebreaker's hands.

"Only that this curse is very uncommon, very painful, and very deadly. I would not want to be on the receiving end of that spell," replied the cursebreaker standing up from his seat. "Glad to be of some assistance to you, aurors, however I hope to never see you in the future. Good day." And he strode out of the room without a backwards glance.

Dan immediately sprang into action.

"Travis, look up all the registered magic folk with ability to do wandless magic throughout Britain – there can't be many. Ryan and Nikita, get the warrant for security detail procedures on all the results."

"Yes sir," answered all three in unison.

Finally they were getting somewhere, and Dan's mood was significantly improved by the description (however vague) of the spellmaker they were seeking.

Whilst Travis and the Captain were busying themselves with the "talent search" (as Travis had crowned the search of wandless magic users within the country), Nikita and Ryan had been ordered to do the most boring, but at the same time, one of the most dangerous tasks an auror was ever assigned. They had to pay a visit to the Master of all law and security dealings within the borders of Great Britain and ask him to issue a security clearance warrant.

This man was more legend than reality to the public – his existence was often debated in the Daily Prophet, and the horror stories related to him were perhaps the most wild and creative of all (ranging from him patrolling the streets of London disguised as a Knockturn Alley beggar to being the only unregistered animagus to be alive, sprouting wings at will and charging criminals from the air with a sword, and even killing the guilty with one look of his eye).

Nikita considered all these speculations to be complete crap, but she wouldn't bet her wand on it. After all, she'd never seen the man's face, and just his voice alone had never failed to send shivers down her spine. She wouldn't be surprised if his methods of protection got a bit…whacky.

The Master was practically unreachable unless you were part of the auror department and had special permission from your Captain to inquire a meeting, which Nikita had gotten two years ago after a particularly nasty case had been found to have connections with international politics and the aurors had to contact a more specialised group of professionals trained in international relations to assist them with negotiations.

Today would be the second time she would enter the Master's office, and Nikita was only too glad Ryan was going in with her, because being alone with that man would be the most unnerving experience of her life.

Ryan coughed beside her, breaking her out of her thoughts and gesturing towards the open doors of a fake dental office located just a few blocks away from the City Hall. They had arrived to the Master's headquarters.

"Names?" asked a double-chinned, middle-aged, bleach blonde lady behind the reception desk immediately after they had shut the door behind themselves.

"Aurors Nikita Morar and Ryan Alden," declared Ryan, not bothering to look at the woman. They both knew she wasn't a real person – just a magically enhanced plastic decoy in case a muggle ventured into the office looking for a new dentist or directions to the nearest Starbucks.

"Permission to enter?" asked the plastic woman in her annoyingly shrill voice.

"Obtained from Captain Daniel Hayes, valid until July of next year," replied Nikita automatically. They'd been through this before, and the questions had not changed the slightest since the first time she'd entered this place.

"Reason for audience?" the lady looked up, attempting to stare them down with her dull, lifeless eyes.

"We need a warrant," said Ryan, and the doll froze in her spot – no doubt transmitting the information she'd received to the upper levels of the building.

After a minute, she unfroze again and nodded.

"You may enter."

Once the department made sure that Nikita's and Ryan's wands were safely stored in a box well out of their reach, they were permitted to enter the audience room, where they found a tall, purple cloaked figure waiting for them.

"Long time, no see Officers," the man greeted them in a flat, dull tone. "How may I help you?"

"We need a warrant for security clearance of all wandless magic users of the country," explained Ryan. "Captain Hayes sent us here to get your permission."

"Why didn't Dan come to see me himself?" pondered the Master. "He's been careful to minimise the contact between us ever since I told him that an auror must not sacrifice his whole life to his job."

This was a surprise to Nikita. The Master apparently knew her Captain quite well, and it seemed that the two were on a first name basis with one another. She'd have to ask Dan about that, since interrogating the Master wouldn't put her into his good books_. But what sort of boss would lecture his own employee on the fact that their work habits were _too good_? _Dan could get obsessive sometimes, but it was this drive that most definitely got the job done.

"With all due respect Master, that was probably the wrong thing to tell our Captain," frowned Nikita. "His job is the most precious thing in his life."

"Perhaps," mused the purple cloaked man, "Perhaps. Quite probable, really...however by bringing you here in his place, Dan only postponed all the pain and suffering he'll be getting." He said this in such a calm and serious tone that Nikita couldn't be sure if he really was joking or not.

"Well, uhh…regarding the warrant?" reminded Ryan. The Master turned on his heels so quickly that Ryan was forced to take a few steps back to avoid falling over from the wind movement.

"The warrant, Officer Alden, was Captain Hayes' way of telling me he needs my help. I'll be in touch," The Master replied curtly. He walked briskly to the door, then stopped and turned to face the two stunned aurors, his purple hood still completely covering his face. "You'll find the signed slip with the dummy."

###

The second Nikita apparated into the flat, she was knocked over by a flying ball of fur. Literally.  
Riley the Puff (Vanessa's dog) was the perfect pet, but sometimes the puppy got a little too enthusiastic at the sight of his beloved humans, and it often ended in the said humans getting ambushed upon their arrival back home.

"Ri, get off!" shouted Vanessa from the other side of the living room, where she was sat with her feet on the coffee table, flipping unenthusiastically through pellyvision channels. Riley wagged his tail and hopped off Nikita's back, bounding instead towards Ana's room.

"That was quite a hello," laughed Nikita as she picked herself up off the floor. "What have you been up to today?"

"Oh this and that," replied Vanessa vaguely. "I have news though!"

Nikita raised an eyebrow and motioned for her to continue.

"Kellan's coming to Hogwarts on the same day you guys are investigating there - he's talking to the seventh years about dragon-related careers, so we might be able to go together."

"That's great!" Nikita exclaimed. "I haven't seen him in months, maybe we can all catch up later on. Besides, our investigation will take a while, so you'll have plenty of time to uhh...discuss the weather with him."

Vanessa grinned widely.

"But of course. There's a lot of weather to be discussed, since it's been a while since we last discussed it. I'm glad that's been settled."

"Oh shut up," said Nikita jokingly. Then something tugged at her memory. "OH! Just an advanced notice, we're going to have to do a security clearance on you sometime within the next few weeks. We've got orders from the Captain."

Vanessa looked up at her, surprised.

"Your Captain thinks I'm a criminal?!"

Nikita laughed.

"Not quite. It's for the case we're working on, and right now we're looking for a spell maker with the ability to perform wand less magic. I know it's a long shot, but we weren't getting anywhere for a while now, so to Dan it's like a breakthrough."

Vanessa grinned once more.

"Book me a time on Thursday, it's no problem."

"Great, I'll do just that."

A few hours and a bowl of pasta later found Nikita in her bed sifting through the apartment bills of the past few months. Their landlady was amazing and didn't once complain about their ridiculously late bill payments, but Nikita felt that three months was pushing it.

A knock came on her door just then, followed by Ana's head poking through the gap.

"Your phone's ringing," she said, chucked the phone at her, and retreated back into the hallway.

Nikita reached over the bed to grab the phone, successfully destroying the neat piles of paper she'd made, and finally put it to her ear.

"What do you want?" she asked somewhat grumpily, attempting to reassemble the paper piles with one hand.

"Nikita, hey," came Rick Castle's voice through the phone. "I've got a question for you. What the hell did you do to my kid?"

"What?" Nikita was genuinely confused by this.

"Ever since we got back from Hogan's last night, she's been quiet and kinda in her own world. She's never like that, y'know? I have this feeling that she's hiding something from me, something important," he sounded very worried, but at the same time sort of jealous - like a kid who wanted in on some group secret, but had been denied the privilege by his peers. However Nikita still couldn't bring herself to tell him what was really going on in his daughter's life.

"Rick, I'm sure it's nothing, stop worrying so much," she said in what she hoped was a soothing tone. "I can talk to her if you'd like, perhaps it'll help."

"Would you do that for me? She seems strangely drawn to you for some reason. She's never like that with anyone else," his voice was uncertain.

"Of course. Pass her the phone. And don't you dare eavesdrop," she warned.

Fine," grumbled Castle. "Here."

There was some shuffling as the little girl adjusted the phone to her ear.

"Nikita? Hi," she breathed into the phone. "I think I need help."

"Oh honey, tell me what it's all about," suggested Nikita.

"Well," Alexis paused, then took a deep breath. "How is it that I'm a witch? Why can't I tell dad, I really want to but every time I open my mouth, I just can't do it! Is being a witch a good thing or a bad thing? Do witches get wands? Can we fly a broom? Does that mean I'm evil? How do I control my witch-i-ness? Where-"

"Whoa whoa, slow down there," laughed Nikita. "Let me tell you something before you freak out completely."

"Okay," Alexis paused, out of breath from her tirade of questions.

"First off, being a witch is awesome. And yes, we do get to have a wand, ride brooms, do spells, and even go to a magical school. But that doesn't mean we're evil. We're quite a bunch, really - kind, fun to be around, generous. We're people. Just like your dad, your grandma, and your gram's ministers. The difference is that we can do magic, and we cannot tell the non-magic folk - muggles we call them - that we can do magic. Besides a few people within the British government and the parents of muggleborn children, nobody knows that magic is real."

"And you're a witch too?" confirmed Alexis.

"Yes, yes I am," grinned Nikita, "And it's great."

"But how do I become like you? How do I get my wand and learn how to turn popcorn into bugs and stuff?"

"You go to a school of witchcraft and wizardry. It's called Hogwarts, and it's the best experience you will ever have."

As Nikita proceeded to describe Hogwarts, she could almost feel the fascination and amazement of the little girl. She'd gone to Hogwarts too, and these were the best years of her life. Alexis would absolutely love it.

"Witches get letters by owl post?!" exclaimed Alexis after they had gone through every single detail of how Hogwarts operated and thoroughly discussed the rules of Quidditch.

Nikita laughed at this.

"Of course! But," she explained, "some of us also like to use muggle cell phones. Most of the time they're faster and much more reliable than owls. Owls do make great pets though, they're very sweet and loyal."

"And everybody gets along at Hogwarts?"

"For the most part. But if anything, you can just put dye in their shampoo. I've done that once back in Second Year."

"I want to be part of that world," whispered Alexis. "I really really do."

"Oh kiddo," sighed Nikita, "you already are."


	8. Of Meetings, Hogwarts, and the Past

**Disclaimer: If I owned it, I wouldn't be broke right now.**

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**Read and review, or a major character gets it!  
Pretty please?**

**- Ana**

**P.S. Thanks Vanessie!**

Nikita and Vanessa arrived to the auror office twenty minutes after everyone else, which was (as usual) Vanessa's fault, this time because she had spent the past hour searching her apartment for her new red shoes. Vanessa's chronic lateness could perhaps only be rivaled by Ana's unpredictability – the girl could show up to an event anywhere from three hours early to three hours late.

"Took you long enough," grumbled Dan as Nikita pushed Vanessa through the door, stepped in herself, and locked it behind them.

"Oh shut up Captain Grumpy," replied Nikita offhandedly and turned to the others. "Shall we?"

They all nodded, and Travis held out a gloved hand with a ballpoint pen in it – their portkey to Hogsmeade.

After an excruciatingly long moment of being twisted through space, they landed on the grassy field not far from the Shrieking Shack and were immediately greeted with a loud cranky _Excuse me!_ because Travis had accidentally knocked over an old lady who was standing nearby.

"Oh Merlin! I'm _so_ sorry ma'am, I didn't see ya there, would you like some help getting up?" He stuttered out, a comical look of shock mixed with embarrassment written all over his face. Nikita couldn't quite collect her thoughts at the situation. Vanessa, on the other hand, seemed to have it all figured out as she was killing herself laughing a few feet away.

"Damn right you should help me up," grumbled the old lady angrily. "We villagers can't even walk down the street in peace without getting knocked over by some damned school kid. Or in this case strange bearded man. What the hell are you doing in _my_ village?!"

The entire group of aurors stared at the lady, even Travis who was supposed to be picking her off the ground was frozen in shock at the 80-something woman's word choice. Only Vanessa seemed unphased by the old woman.

"Get your ass in gear then, you pureblood Slytherin scum! We shall not tolerate your tricks for any longer! I hope your grandchildren are proud of you and your vile mouth!"

To everyone's astonishment, the old lady easily jumped up from the ground and grinned at the lot of them. Then she clapped.

"Great performance everyone. Although I don't think any of you really _were_ performing," she said, then scrunched her face up in concentration.

And that was when Nikita finally realised what was going on. Before them, in the exact place where the cranky old woman had been, stood a tall young woman with short green hair, sparkling blue eyes, and a wide grin.

Travis smacked himself in the head.

"My goodness, Katie!" he cried. "How did I not guess this from the start?!"

"You had us all fooled!" exclaimed Ryan. "Great job on the concealment!"

"She's a metamorphmagus, what else did you expect?" grumbled Dan, crossing his muscular arms over his chest.

"I see our Captain is as cheerful as ever!" laughed Katie. "How have you guys been? It's crazy boring here, I want to go outside of this stupid castle and do fun stuff with you guys!"

"You, miss, are on probation – don't forget that," warned Dan.

"Oh don't worry _Captain_, I didn't _forget that_," she mocked. "I've been on probation for so long that I don't remember _why_ I'm on probation."

"Would you like a reminder?" asked Dan, looking at the short haired girl with amusement.

"No I think I'll be okay, thanks," Katie replied, grinning at the Captain.

The cause of Katie's probation period was supposed to be a secret, however they all knew well enough that her fascination with guns was what got her into some deep trouble with Dan. It was one thing to shoot targets in training, it was quite another to be shooting at trees in a muggle park.

"Well, let's get a move on, shall we?" suggested Ryan. "I don't want to be stuck in this place for any more than I absolutely have to."

The trip from the Honeydukes sweetshop to the statue of the One-Eyed Witch in the Hogwarts castle took all of ten minutes, but by the end of it, they were all out of breath from their journey through the stuffy, uphill tunnel.

"So," said Katie into Nikita's ear once they both climbed out of the passageway, "How's the Dan-hunt going?"

_Great, she'd known this was coming. Guess she'd have to play dumb on this one._

"The what?" Nikita raised her eyebrows in what she hoped was genuine-looking expression of surprise.

Katie's hair immediately changed colour to neon orange.

"Remember how I got _Outstanding_ in my lie detecting course? I think you know exactly what I'm referring to," she grinned evilly.

_Damn it Katie!_

"There isn't any Dan-hunt, Katie! I got over that _years_ ago," she informed the girl.

Katie's nose elongated into a very carrot-like shape.

"Do you do that in front of the kids too? It's creeping me out," Nikita continued.

"For the first time in my life I can't tell if you're lying," Katie tilted her head to the side and scratched her carrot-nose.

"I'm not," insisted Nikita. "Just because I used to like him back then, doesn't mean I haven't moved on since then."

"Who used to like whom back when?" questioned Dan as he climbed out of the passageway.

Katie rolled her eyes and saluted the man.

"Nobody used to like no one back never sir!" she reported.

"Well please tell Nobody that they shouldn't be gossiping on the job."

"Will do sir!" replied Katie and immediately shut up.

"What's next Captain?' asked Travis. He, Ryan, and Vanessa had finally joined them in the hallway.

"Now we go and – " Katie started, but a stern voice cut her short.

"What's going on here?"

Professor McGonagall stood in the hallway with her hands on her hips. The lady must've been at least a hundred, and Nikita was impressed with the stature with which the woman carried herself.

Katie's appearance quickly changed back to her relatively regular features.

"Headmistress," said Dan respectively, "how have you been?"

"I've been quite well Mr. Hayes, thank you for your concern," replied the lady dryly. "But my question to you is what do you think you're doing, standing in the middle of the hallway? I thought you lot were here undercover."

"We just climbed out of the passageway, Professor," explained Ryan.

"Well don't just _stand_ there! Students might see you, and Merlin forbid they find that Hogsmeade passageway – I'll have to deal with firewhiskey parties all year long. Don't they teach you _anything_ in that concealment class of yours?!" scoffed McGonagall.

Vanessa coughed.

"What is it, Miss Yip?" asked the Headmistress.

"I'll go find Kellan, is that alright?"

McGonagall shrugged and waved her off. Immediately Vanessa turned on her heel and walked away, her bright red shoes giving off a glint in the dark hallway as she retreated.

"I think…" started Katie uncertainly, but McGonagall gave her a stern look, and the metamorphmagus immediately changed her mind. "I think I have a Gryffindor-Slytherin class to teach in ten minutes."

And she too left as quickly as her legs would carry her.

"Aurors," McGonagall turned to the remaining group, "what can I do for you?"

Travis spoke up for the first time, and Nikita noticed small smile appear on the old woman's face momentarily. Travis was one of the primary troublemakers of his time, and had spent his fair share of hours in the Headmistress' office.

"We're looking for someone with the talent, Professor. With so much talent that they would perhaps be able to create spells and curses. And since all talent originates from this place," he motioned towards the ceiling of the castle, "we were hoping to find out some things from you, and the recent history of Hogwarts – perhaps from Harry Potter's time at school to the present."

"That's not an easy task, Mr. Skiff, but I will do everything in my power to help. We can't say exactly how many former students would be capable of these tasks, but I'm able to give you a list of names with outstanding results that may have gone on to use their talents in a way which you describe."

"You have a _list_?!" exclaimed Ryan. "I thought this would be much harder than it is."

"Oh no Mr. Alden, there's no list. _You_ will be making the list," the woman looked almost evil saying that.

A quarter of an hour later, the auror squad found themselves in the dungeons – more specifically, in a large square room filled top to bottom with bookshelves.

"This room holds all of Hogwarts' yearbooks, from the founding of the school itself, to present day," explained the Headmistress.

"No kidding…" muttered Travis, while Ryan's surprised expression suggested that he was thinking something along the lines of _Hogwarts has yearbooks?!_

"Oh yes Mr. Skiff, it's quite a collection. You're looking for students with an _Outstanding_ medal on their graduation robes. They are the ones who may have gone on to pursue higher level magical qualifications." McGonagall turned to go, but then stopped and eyed the team. "You may want to take shifts," she said and left the room, leaving the aurors wide-eyed and open-mouthed.

Dan came out of his shock first.

"If any of you _accio_ the yearbooks, I will be sure to _fire your ass_ faster than you can raise your wand."

"Whoa, watch your language dear Captain!" exclaimed Travis. "We're in a playground with a crapload of innocent little shits running around here! Wouldn't want to corrupt those little bastards."

"Thanks for the tip, Skiff, I'll keep that in mind," chuckled Dan. "Why don't you and Ryan take a hike, and Nikita here and I will take the first shift. We'll switch in two hours."

"Will do, Cap'n!" saluted Travis.

Ryan copied him, and three seconds later they were both out the door and out of sight. Dan turned to Nikita.

"Well then, where shall we start?" he offered her a small smile, and Nikita's stomach gave an unexpected lurch.

_Ugh._

"Why don't we start from our year?" she suggested.

"Our year? We were one year apart if I recall correctly," laughed the Captain.

"Right, then uhh…" Nikita staggered and mentally cursed herself. Since when did she _stutter_?! She took a deep breath and tried again. "Let's start with my year, and go backwards. I doubt our spellmaker can be much younger than me."

"Good thinking," complimented Dan, and pointed towards one of the bookshelves. "_Accio_ yearbook from Nikita Morar's year."

Immediately, a single bright pink yearbook came floating down from the shelf he had pointed at. Dan chuckled.

"I take it you didn't take part of your year's yearbook committee," he guessed.

"You're right, I wasn't on the committee," she confirmed.

"…otherwise the entire yearbook would've been black," continued Dan, smirking.

"_HEY!_" scoffed Nikita and smacked him on the shoulder. "I resent that!"

"Oh please, the amount of time Ana and I spent making bets on your outfit of the day probably rivals the amount of time we spent in classes within a year."

This was news to Nikita.

"You and Ana were _friends_ during school?!"

"Better, we were house mates, and that means a whole lot more," Dan smirked again.

Nikita rolled her eyes.

"You do realise that Ana and I picked out outfits the day before, so she knew what I was going to wear beforehand," stated Nikita. Dan's face morphed into a grimace of shock and admiration mixed into one.

"Oh the devious little devil!" he exclaimed. "You wouldn't _believe_ the amount of money I lost to her throughout my Hogwarts years. And she's been playing me this whole time!"

"What can I say, she _is_ a Slytherin, being devious is in her job description," smiled Nikita, for once proud of her friend for deceiving her Captain and _former_ crush. "Oh look, there she is!" she pointed to a photo in the yearbook, in which Ana was making faces at the camera.

"She was quite the troublemaker that one, wasn't she," pondered Dan.

"_Was?_" Nikita scoffed. "Cap'n, that girl is giving me trouble to this day!"

"Really? Perhaps that's also her Slytherin destiny," mocked Dan. "I became good friends with her mostly because she was one of the very few girls in my house who didn't stalk me like a lunatic."

Nikita flipped through a few pages of the yearbook, noting any extraordinary achievements on a clipboard beside her.

"Don't flatter yourself Captain," she smirked, "not that many people were after you to begin with."

"Not that many. Just, y'know, most of them," shrugged Dan and threw her a confident grin.

"Arrogance – I never liked that quality in Slytherins. You always try to blow things out of proportion to show everyone how grand you really are," stated Nikita, flipping through the last few pages of the yearbook and shutting it with a loud _snap_.

Dan took it from her hands, banished it back to the bookshelf, and retrieved his own yearbook – a black one with gold swirls all over it.

"Looks like you somehow got yourself into my year's yearbook committee after all," he held up the book. "And it's not arrogance, it's called confidence. Us, Slytherins, are confident in ourselves and in one another. That's what gives us our strength. Although after a while you stop trusting your fellow house members, you can still base your trust in their confidence and their desire to prove themselves. Being a Slytherin takes you places."

"Perhaps," agreed Nikita, and summoned a yearbook for herself to look at. "Although I think you lot are rather secretive. It gets on people's nerves, you know?"

Dan squinted at her.

"What makes you think that?"

"Well first off there's you. You don't tell us anything that isn't absolutely necessary for us to know."

"Like what?" this time Dan's dark eyes went wide in surprise.

"Like everything!" Nikita exclaimed. "Don't even try to play dumb on this one – you and Katie aren't the only ones who're good at detecting lies."

"Well give me an example then," he shot back, placing his yearbook on the table and crossing his arms over his chest. "Please, go on."

"You assign tasks to us throughout every case, but you never seem to be doing anything yourself. Yet, I have this strange feeling – call it intuition – that you are completing tasks which are much more important than the ones you assign to us. Then there's your strange relationship with the Master. He seems to know you really well, Dan, almost way too well. And finally there's your personal life. You never talk about it, mention it in passing, or give any indication that you even have one. You were the Hogwarts heartthrob in your day, there is just no damn way you dedicated your life solely to your work!"

Nikita finally ran out of breath, and was forced to halt her tirade. She looked over at her Captain for a response.

Dan was leaning against the table, staring out the window into the grounds below with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"Have you been taught nothing in auror training, Officer Morar? The first rule is to put _facts_ – cold-blooded, straight up _facts_ ahead of any form of intuition. Intuition may lead you into a ditch, and you'll be dead before you know it. Secondly, you're an auror. Aurors figure things out. It's your _job_. However if I'm not telling you something, it's probably better that you don't know, because having extra information in your head can be dangerous, and I put my team's safety before anything else. As for my personal life, I think you're all reading too much into it. There isn't one. I have _one_ life, and that's my life as an auror. I think that answers all your questions."

His tone hadn't changed in the slightest, but Nikita knew that their conversation had come to an end. Getting any information out of Dan was mentally exhausting, and for the most part a pointless waste of time. It had been the same when she was trying to pry information out of Ana the other morning; it was definitely looking like the vague, secretive interactions were a Slytherin specialty.

With a sigh, she turned back to the pile of yearbooks on the desk and flipped one open at random.

The yearbook she'd picked was dated seven years before her own. She'd entered Hogwarts just after these people had left it, and (for some reason) to her that felt like a missed opportunity. A missed opportunity to meet these people, to spend at least one year walking the halls of Hogwarts together. She felt rather stupid for feeling a twinge of sadness about something as meaningless as this, but she couldn't quite help it.

Nikita glanced at Dan, but he didn't notice – he was busy sorting through yearbooks himself. She flipped another page, then another, and then two more. She wrote down a name of an outstanding student from the Q section, then flipped another page. And then she saw something that she at first thought was a trick of light. Then, looking at it closely, Nikita realised that she was not mistaken.

In the middle of the R section, right under a rather wide, lolly-eating boy called Mark Rillman was something that shouldn't have existed in _any_ yearbook of Hogwarts. Waving at her from the page with a wide grin plastered all over his face, was a younger (but still very much recognisable) version of none other than Richard_ freaking _Castle. With an _Outstanding_ medal pinned to his graduation robe.

_Bloody fucking hell._


	9. Of Alcohol, Confessions, and Meetings

**Hey guys!**

**I'm SORRY I made you wait for this long! Honestly.**

**Now I'm back from vacation, but the fall semester just started, so there'll be lots of assignments, tests, etc...**  
**I promise to keep writing this though, even though you may have to wait a little longer for the chapters to come out. **

**My editor (bless her soul) almost killed me for taking so long on this chapter, but (believe me) it's pretty difficult to live up to the expectations after the bombshell I dropped on you in the last chapter. That was why I took so long on this chapter. **

**Hope you like it! Please review, the reviews really mean a lot to me, and they're the reason I'm continuing this :)**

**- Ana**

Nikita could feel the alcohol buzz kicking in as she took another sip of rum straight from the bottle. She knew that it was probably a bad idea to be resorting to Ana's methods of dealing with her issues, but it helped.

At least for the time being.

After their shift in the yearbook room ended, Nikita and Dan decided to take an hour to themselves, then meet by the Black Lake - an hour which Nikita decided to spend on a contemplative stroll around the Hogsmeade Village. Perhaps that would help clear her head. After all, even the idea of Richard Castle being a wizard seemed preposterous - the man was so entirely muggle that even the best aurors couldn't have identified him as a magical being - however the all the facts spoke against him. She wasn't entirely sure how she'd ended up in the Hog's Head, but (almost against her own will) she found herself buying an entire bottle of dragon rum from the pub.

When her hour was up, she headed back to the Black Lake and, perhaps because she didn't have anything else to do, she started drinking. Which was how Dan found her a couple minutes later.

"Drinking on the job I see?" he raised an eyebrow incredulously. "I didn't think you were capable."

"Oh shut your face," she muttered back, beyond caring what her Captain thought of her at that moment.

"Well if you won't listen to my orders, at least recognise that it's quite rude to be drinking alone."

Silently, Nikita handed him the bottle, and he took a swig. Then he immediately spat it out.

"What is this crap?"

"Rum. This one is Ana's favourite actually," she explained. "Try it."

Cautiously, Dan lifted the bottle to his lips and took a careful sip.

"Interesting," he pondered. "It's not too bad, very…frosty."

He took a full on swig and continued, "still though, why are you drinking on the job?"

Nikita turned her gaze away from the lake to glance at her Captain.

"People lie," she said curtly.

"Well of course they do, for some of us it's in the job description," replied Dan.

"That's not what I meant."

"In that case please care to elaborate," he took another swig of her drink and lay back on the grass, patting a spot next to him as an invitation – one which Nikita, being used to following her Captain's orders, accepted without a second thought.

Lowering herself onto the ground beside the Captain, she plucked a white flower from a spot between them and immediately shredded it in her fingers. Dan didn't move, she knew he was waiting for her to speak.

"Sometimes you meet people and, for no reason at all, you feel like your life suddenly makes sense. You feel at home with them, no matter where you might be, and you feel like they can never disappoint you or break your trust, to the point where – when they do break it – you want to forget all about it and start over."

Dan turned his head to look at her, his usually lifeless dark eyes glinting with some unrecognisable emotion.

"Sometimes the only people you should trust are the ones who are unable to betray you."

That statement was so unexpected that Nikita pushed herself up on her elbows to get a better look at the man lying next to her. Dan's face, as usual, betrayed nothing. The calm expression with which he was chewing on a flower stem gave away no clues, but Nikita could still sense that something was amiss in the man's heart – perhaps that same something which made him the impersonal robotic character he was.

But all that contradicted the strange, almost human, declaration that had escaped his lips moments ago, and despite her own issue hanging fresh over her head, Nikita's curiosity was sparked.

"Like who?" she asked, laying back down and looking up at the passing by clouds, trying to sound nonchalant.

"Like me," came the reply, "like Travis, like Ryan."

He broke off.

"Like Ana?" added Nikita after a moment of silence.

The Captain snorted loudly.

"No, definitely not," he chuckled. "Like Vanessa perhaps, but not Ana."

_What._

"Why not?"

"She's a Slytherin through and through," he explained. "Never trust a Slytherin if you value your life and reputation."

"You're a Slytherin as well," she retorted.

"Yes," he agreed, "but I'm also an auror, and that says a whole lot more."

"I don't associate with liars and manipulators," Nikita declared after another moment, "and I don't trust people lightly. But when I do trust someone, I expect them to follow through."

"Liars and manipulators are quite good at pretending to be trustworthy people," Dan chuckled, "that's really what our jobs are based on."

Nikita sighed and rolled over onto her stomach. It seemed her mind had entered a state where comprehension and analysis were having a rather difficult time, and she simply couldn't strain her brain any longer. She needed a break.

She sat up, reached for her now half-empty bottle, and looked around. It was getting dark and the first stars were beginning to show their presence in the sky. The Hogwarts castle was visible in the distance, magnificent as always with its magical lights and enchanting towers. It's been years since she'd last sat here staring at it, and only now she realised how much her life had changed since then. Her family was gone – dead within a short few hours of her eighteenth birthday celebration, the freak accident driving her into a spiral of life-changing decisions. Pursuing a career in law enforcement, moving in with Ana, and throwing herself into a vengeful cycle of sleep-eat-work were perhaps the main landmarks her life had pinned down ever since she'd left Hogwarts.

"This was your home as well, wasn't it?" Dan's quiet voice broke the silence. He sounded almost…human.

"Still is," she replied. "It feels like I know everything about this place, but the mighty Hogwarts still holds on to its secrets."

"I haven't been back since we graduated," said Dan thoughtfully. "I wonder if my common room has changed any."

"Isn't Katie the head of Slytherin?"

The Captain shrugged and got up from the grass. Nikita followed his lead.

"I believe so. She still gets to feel attached to her home…she gets to protect this little haven while we go off to protect the rest of the world."

Nikita could sense something akin to jealousy in the man's voice, and for the first time in her life she saw him not as her almighty captain, not as a cocky heartthrob, but as a tired and broken man who hid behind a mask of confidence to protect himself from the world. He was only human. Just like herself, just like Vanessa and Ana, just like...Castle.

Castle. She felt like he betrayed her, broke her trust, but what if there was something more to his strange act? What was hidden beneath that facade? Was it possible that he was protecting himself, or was it something more…_criminal_?

She stopped in her tracks as a realisation hit her. They hadn't known that Castle was a wizard. The trace didn't register it, which meant that the Ministry had no records of this man in their system. And yet he had gone to and graduated from Hogwarts, and his daughter had magical abilities.

Nikita turned to Dan and opened her mouth to speak, but stopped short. If she turned Castle in, that would be the end of their companionship. On the other hand if she didn't, she'd be breaking her oath as an auror, and (as Dan had put it only a few moments earlier) an auror was the one person who wouldn't dare to break somebody's trust. Did she really have a choice?

"You know," said the Captain as they began walking back towards the village, "keep trusting, Niks. You're lucky enough to still be able to trust, even after the horrible tragedies of your past that have been eating away at your soul. This trust you have, it's a sign that you're still alive."

And she had her answer.

###

Nikita entered the Hog's Head once more with her heart in the right place and her mind made up.

Dan led her into the pub and headed straight for one of the tables in the back where Katie's bright green head was poking out from between two booth dividers. Travis, Ryan and Kellan were also sitting at the table, Travis already halfway through his (presumably second) pint of mead.

"You know, there has got to be some lead with all the work we've done today and all," Katie was saying in an overly cheery tone, which also probably stemmed from the half empty glass of firewhiskey on the table in front of her.

"As if you did any work," scoffed Dan.

"I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW," bellowed Katie, half-standing from her seat and waving her fists about, then immediately collapsed back into it and gave a sigh of defeat.

"Katie, honey, move over so that Niks here can sit down," Ryan tugged on her sleeve. Once both she and Dan got seated, he continued. "As the most sober man here, I demand that you all stop drinking. We have business to discuss."

Travis put his glass down and stared at his friend.

"Mate, did you just suggest we _stop_ drinking?!"

Dan raised a hand, "First talk, then drink. First off, there's the matter of our second murder, who followed up on that?"

Travis raised his index finger in the air.

"Aye Cap'n. Her name was Angela Browman, age forty five, a real hot chick back in her day – Alden, you should really check out those photos man – she used to be a model in her early twenties," he flicked a toothpick across the table at Ryan, who dove out of the way into Katie's lap to dodge it. "When she turned thirty, her father, the famous Senator Sidney Browman, granted her a job as a Junior Minister of City Development, and died later that year in a rather suspicious elevator shaft accident, the details of which were quickly buried by the Scotland Yard never to be mentioned again."

"What does that have to do with our vic?" interrupted Katie, her hair turning from green to flaming red and back to Slytherin-green within a matter of seconds.

Travis shot her an annoyed look. Nikita had long noticed that Travis was only annoyed by Katie when both had had a lot to drink.

"Nothin' yet sugar pie, I'm simply setting the bearings on her background," he scratched the bridge of his nose and continued on. "Anyways, Angela was moved up to Senior Minister, a position she stayed in for the next fifteen years, before she too was pickled off by the same spell as our first vic."

"And there's no connection to the wizarding community whatsoever?" piped up Kellan who, until this moment, had been quietly absorbing the story, periodically raising his own pint to take a sip.

Travis opened his mouth to speak, but stopped short as the cute waitress came up to their table carrying a tray of fish and chips. She set the tray down on the table and took out her notepad.

"Anything else you'd like?" she asked, giving everyone a once over, her eyes lingering on Dan for much longer than Nikita thought appropriate.

"No thank you," she said curtly, dismissing the girl with a wave of her hand. The waitress nodded and left, her lacquered black heels clicking against the wooden floor surface as she went.

Nikita leaned back in her seat and surveyed the group. Katie smirked and raised an eyebrow as Nikita looked at her, but thankfully didn't question her further.

"So as I was saying," Travis continued, evidently displeased by the interruption, "there ain't any connection. The vics are exceptionally muggle, not a trace of magical blood. And they don't know any wizards and aren't aware of the wizarding world. That's what stumps us."

"So basically you don't know the motive, and without the motive you can't go any further," simplified Kellan, twiddling his thumbs subconsciously.

"That's right bro," nodded Travis.

"What if there isn't any?" said Kellan thoughtfully.

Katie's ears grew as she took a gulp of her drink.

"Isn't any _what_?" she asked in a slightly slurred voice, leaning her body into Ryan's side to stay upright. He put his arm around her shoulder to stabilise her as she swayed from side to side.

"Isn't any connection," Kellan continued. "What if they _are_ purely muggle and they _don't_ know anything about our world? What if they were killed for an entirely different reason, unrelated to them as people?"

"Which would be…?" came Dan's voice from beside Nikita.

Kellan scrunched up his eyebrows.

"Lemme think about that one," he replied, his eyes darting towards a booth across from theirs for a moment. Nikita followed his gaze and saw two cloaked figures with their heads bent closely over the table seemingly in a heated discussion. It was impossible to tell who the people under the cloaks were, as all Nikita could see were the tips of their shoes poking out from beneath the long robes. Bright red ladies' shoes and black mens' combat boots. _Those are some nice shoes too_, she thought.

"So what will we do with today's investigation, Cap'n?" Travis' voice broke Nikita out of her observational exercise. Damn, that'd be the first time she'd ever gotten distracted at a business meeting. Or whatever the hell this was, considering that this was the first time they were having an auror meeting in a pub.

"You guys are already done in the Yearbook Room?" came Katie's inquiry, her head now buried in Ryan's chest which muffled her usually loud voice. Her eyes were already closed and she looked utterly exhausted and helpless.

"Well, we have a list of the exceptionally nerdy ex-students, but we don't quite know where to start yet," answered Dan to the both of them.

Katie replied with a loud yawn, and buried her head deeper into Ryan's chest. Travis rolled his eyes.

"You better take her up to the castle before she falls asleep completely," he nodded at the snoozing girl. "And I don't know where to start either. What do we do, question them all at random?"

_Well…_

Nikita took a big gulp of air, and raised her voice above the drunken bellows of the people around them.

"I think I might know something."


	10. Of Paper, Purple, and Panic

**Disclaimer: own Harry Potter I do not.**

**Hey folks, **  
**Here's the next chapter. Not quite as suspens-ey or anything, but start looking forward to the next two , cause those are gonna be chaotic.**  
**PLEASE REVIEW, or I'm afraid I will have to kill you. Seriously.**  
**Thanks to my editor, she's doing an amazing job (you wouldn't believe the amount of crap you'd have to read if it wasn't for her work).**  
**Enjoy the chapter!**  
**Cheers!**

**- Ana**

Nikita hummed lightly as she walked through the open auror office door, a cup of coffee and paperwork for the day clutched tightly in her hand. It had been a rather fine morning: the sun was shining, Hogan had given her a free bagel to go with her coffee, and Ana hadn't been home to annoy her early in the morning. She wasn't sure the last time Ana had _been _home, in fact.

She was greeted by Katie, her green hair a mess, pale grey eyes bloodshot and glaring at the middle panel of the murderboard as she sat sprawled in Ryan's chair.

"Aren't you supposed to be teaching…?" asked Nikita.

"Million dollar question!" Katie grumbled, as she waved an arm above her head. "Why would good ol' Katie be lounging at the boring auror office instead of torturing a herd of fifth year Hufflepuffs with potions way beyond their skill level just for the sake of watching them turn their hair green?"

"So they've finally kicked you out of the school for being a hooligan?" guessed Nikita, setting the coffee down on her desk, and chucking the completed paperwork on Dan's desk as she passed by.

Katie snorted.

"I wish. McGonagall clings on to me like her life depends on it. I think she's in love with me."

It was Nikita's turn to snort.

"Why are you here then?"

"Dan asked me to come back for this case. Says he could really use my insights since none of you are coming up with anything," Katie waved her arms around and muttered something along the lines of _'useless aurors_' as she spun around in the chair.

"If that's the only insight you're able to offer us, I will happily prolong your suspension," declared Dan, walking out of the interrogation room.

"Oh no, there will be no need for that Cap'n," Katie said, smiling apologetically as she stopped spinning and sat upright in the chair.

Nikita had always known that Katie wasn't too happy on her suspension, but immediate obedience of the Captain's orders was something Nikita had never seen before from Katie. _She must've been bored out of her life in that potions dungeon, _thought Nikita.

"Good girl, now get out of Ryan's seat and bring me those papers from my desk please," Dan pointed at the stack of paperwork that was yet to be completed.

Katie grudgingly vacated the chair and walked over to the other side of the room to retrieve the papers.

"You let her off the suspension early?!" exclaimed Nikita. "You never do that, are you growing old already or something?"

"We need all the help we can get. And she's got a sharp mind and a great deal of talent," explained Dan, turning to face Nikita with a deadly serious expression on his face. "We need this case solved, and I'll go to any lengths to make sure we get it done."

"Where should I put Mount Paperwork?" asked Katie as she came up to them, straining under the weight of the enormous stack.

"You're a witch, dumbass," Nikita rolled her eyes and pointed her wand at the paper. "_Wingardium Leviosa_."

Katie gave a dramatic sigh and put her hands on her hips as the large pile of paper floated upwards slightly and towards the spot where Dan stood.

"Can't a girl do anything the muggle way around here?!" Katie exclaimed with a touch of annoyance.

"_Sorry_, didn't know you were a masochist," Nikita shot back defensively. _What have these years of exile at Hogwarts done to this pureblood girl?!_

Ryan and Travis entered the room, each carrying a stack of paper high enough to rival Katie's Mount Paperwork. "What _is it_ with you guys and not using your magical capabilities to make your lives easier?!" muttered Nikita as she shook her head.

"Sup Cap'n," greeted Travis, "and good morning to you too Miss Anti-Paper Labourer," he continued, throwing the heap down on his desk, and shooting a sarcastic smirk at Nikita. Meanwhile, Ryan bent down to set his own stack neatly onto his newly unoccupied chair.

Dan looked taken aback.

"What the fuck do you propose we do with all this?!" he demanded, running a hand through his dark hair in frustration.

"I'm glad you asked," said Travis as he settled down and adjusted his chair. "These are the records of all magically capable individuals within the _entire bloody magical community across Europe and North America_. You wanna know why this happened?"

Nikita, and Katie shook their heads, while Dan grumbled a disconcerted grunt of '_Why?_'.

"Because," Travis continued, now spinning around in his seat to face them and folding his hands over his chest, "this _dufus_ over here," he jerked his thumb in Ryan's direction, "gave the wrong instructions to auror trainees and, being the hardworking asses they are, they researched and pulled up files on virtually _every damned wizard in the world_ instead of looking up a few prominent names across Great Britain like they were supposed to do in the first place. Now guess who's gonna be sorting all this crap?"

Dan, Katie and Nikita simultaneously nodded their heads in Ryan's direction. He sighed dejectedly.

"These things happen, alright? It was a mistake and I'll fix it as soon as I can," he said defensively and immediately flinched as a stack of paper landed on his table with a loud _thump_.

Nikita looked over to see Travis with a giant smirk on his face, placing his wand back behind his ear where he usually kept it. "Have fun bro," he smacked his fist down on his now clear desk and gave Katie a wink. "I'm sure our dear friend Katie over here won't mind helping you out."

Ryan glared at Travis, but nodded to Katie nonetheless.

"Will you...please?" he asked desperately, cocking an eyebrow in her direction.

She sighed dramatically.

"Well, if you _insist_," she said, a small smile creeping onto her face.

Nikita decided she'd had enough paper-related conversations to last her a month. Glancing at her watch and grabbing a purple file off her desk, she motioned for Dan and Travis to follow her. Surprisingly, they did so without protest, and the three of them quietly exited the office, leaving Ryan and Katie to sort through the paperwork.

###

Hogan greeted the three aurors with a warm smile as they entered the shop. This wouldn't be the first time Dan's department held their meetings at the coffee shop, so both Hogan and Jeff knew the general procedure of what was about to happen. Dan took the trip to Jeff's counter to order the coffee, while Travis and Nikita sank down into the comfortable armchairs by the fire.

"Anything you wanna tell me girl?" questioned Travis, leaning forward with a smug grin on his face.

Nikita met his gaze and shrugged.

"Not that I know of…" she trailed off.

"Not even about our dear ol' Danny over there?" Travis jerked his thumb towards the coffee counter.

"Did you just call me _Danny_?!" asked Dan as he walked over, carrying a tray of Hogan's best brew, three large white coffee mugs, and a plate of baked goods.

Travis grinned.

"Sorry cap'n. In my defence though, it was said with love and respect," he smiled apologetically. Dan snorted and rolled his eyes as he placed the tray on the table between them.

"Whatever you say, just remember that I'm the one who transfers your earnings into your Gringotts vault. A slip of the pen, and there'll be one less zero on the money transfer documents."

Travis saluted.

"Yes, sir!"

Dan rolled his eyes and proceeded to sit down in the remaining armchair. He then turned to Nikita.

"Have you got the file? You better not have left it to those two imbeciles to sort out," he warned.

"Nah cap'n, I got it on my way out," she grinned and produced a tiny purple file from her pocket.

She tapped it twice with her wand and the infinitesimal purple file grew in size, now taking up half the coffee table.

Travis reached for it, but before he could open it, Dan slammed his hand on the file.

"Before we open this, we must all be sure that we're looking at this as objectively as is humanly _possible_. If you think that your feelings may affect your judgement in any way, you should be questioning whether or not you should be taking this case," he looked pointedly at Nikita.

She gave a slight nod to show that she understood.

"Don't worry cap'n, we don't even know the man, why wouldn't we be objective?" questioned Travis.

"No matter, go on then," Dan took his hand off the file and Travis flipped it open enthusiastically.

The first page of the document contained a full body photograph of Richard Castle, and even knowing that he was a suspect in a murder case, Nikita couldn't shake the feeling that there was so much more to him than met the eye. She knew they had a long way with the investigation, but perhaps this could clear some things up. She flipped the next page, which contained the description and basic personal info on the man. Nothing stuck out. His mother, his daughter, his ex-wife. Nothing special.

She flipped again. It came up with the description of his career as a novelist.

Another page revealed his financial statements and credit history, all of which (Nikita noted) were in excellent condition.

One more turn, and Nikita was looking at the back cover of the folder.

She looked up at the two aurors opposite her. Dan was frowning at the file, and Travis' eyebrows were scrunched up in confusion.

"Those are the Scotland Yard documents," he stated plainly. "Where are ours?"

Normally, the Ministry of Magic held detailed records on every witch or wizard in the country without fail. All wizarding records had two parts to them: muggle police files and the full magical account of their life. The fact that Richard Castle's file came up empty was unheard of, especially since Nikita was now sure he had been a student of Hogwarts.

Travis gave a low whistle and Dan leaned back in his chair.

"We have an undocumented wizard on the loose," Dan stated in a matter-of-fact way. "I don't think that's ever happened before."

"How can you be so sure?" questioned Nikita.

"Because since the War ended, the only wizards without a trace or a record placed on them are those who are dead," said Travis quietly.

"Those records are there to protect the people," Dan continued. "Any attempt to have this trace removed is punishable by Azkaban time."

Nikita looked at each auror in turn. Travis seemed deep in thought with his fingers lightly tapping the edge of his coffee cup. Dan was looking straight at her, a small apologetic smile evident on his face. He knew – Nikita was quite aware of that. Although she hadn't provided him with any names, the captain's deductive methods were top notch. The man knew everything.

"No innocent man would be hiding from the law like this," supplied Travis in the same quiet voice he had used earlier.

A sense of panic began clawing at Nikita's stomach. _Why would Castle keep such a public life if he was running away from the wizarding world? Where were the records on him? _

_Shit_...she had to keep it together. The captain had warned her to be objective. She looked up briefly – just in time to see Dan looking right at her with those dark eyes and furrowed brow.

The captain's gaze hardened, Nikita could feel it burning through her very being.

"Go get him, Niks," he said in a hushed tone.

Nikita sighed and broke eye contact. As she stood up and turned to leave Hogan's, she could still feel the heat from Dan's fixed stare as she left them sitting by the fire.

###

_Deep breaths_, Nikita told herself.

She was once again at the door of Castle's loft, but unlike all those other times she had been here, this time she was wearing her auror uniform, and her wand was firmly clutched in her hand.

She didn't want to do this, she knew she didn't. But she didn't have a choice in the matter_. _Her captain had ordered this man's arrest.

_This man was a suspect in a double homicide_, she reminded herself.

With a quick glance behind her to make sure the two uniform officers from the lower auror ranks she had brought with her were stationed properly, Nikita took a step towards the door and gave two loud knocks on the door.

"By the power of the Wizarding Law, Richard Castle, I demand that you open up," she bellowed the well-practiced line. She decided that his name sounded ridiculously out of place in that phrase.

After a few seconds of silence there was scrambling behind the door, and then it opened, revealing the concerned face of Martha Rogers.

"What's all this yelling?" she questioned sternly then, recognising Nikita, her expression turned to confusion. "What's going on?"

Nikita's hard expression softened slightly at the sight of the magnificent woman.

"Martha, I need to see Rick, is he home?" she said in a less demanding tone.

Martha took in Nikita's appearance and frowned. Nikita almost wished she had come alone. She could feel a sense of betrayal as Martha opened the door a touch wider, still standing in the aurors' way.

"I should've predicted that this world wouldn't let him go without a fight. But I didn't think that _you_, of all people…" she trailed off, then sighed and stepped aside. "He's in his office."

Nikita looked the older woman in the eyes and nodded.

"Thank you," she said as gently as she could, and stepped into the apartment. The two officers entered as well, and Martha closed the door behind them.

Nikita rapped on the office door with her knuckles.

"Castle!" she yelled.

The door opened, and Castle stepped out, looking ready to kill.

"WHAT?!" he bellowed back, then, realising whom he was speaking to, he rubbed his eyes. "Nikita?! What the devil are you doing here?"

His hair was disheveled, clothes crumpled, and he had the general appearance of someone who'd spent the morning frustratingly and fruitlessly sitting at their desk. Nikita fought to keep her expression straight as she opened her mouth to speak.

"Richard Castle, on behalf of the Ministry of Magic, Department of Aurors, Homicide Unit, I'm afraid I will need you to come with me."


End file.
